I.I  i  IRARY 

Univ!         v  of  California 

Mrs.  SARAH   P.  WALSWORTH. 


.•'  October,  1894. 
6*7  (ell   ■     Class  No. 

— L__  -Ls, 


C 


THE  CAXTONS 


SI  /cmihj  $tdm 


SIR  EDWARD  BULWER  LITTON,  BART. 


t;  Every  family  is  a  history  in  itself,  and  even  a  poem  to  those  who  know  how  to 
search  its  pages." — Lamabtine. 

'•Di,  probos  mores  docili  juventae, 
Di,  senectuti  placid*  quietem, 
Rornulae  genti  date  remque,  prolemque, 
Et  decus  omne.'' 

Hoeat.,  Carmen  Sceculare. 


LIBRARY    EDITION. 


NEW     Y  OR  K.- 
HARPER   &    BROTHERS,    PUBLISHERS, 
FRANKLIN     SQUARE. 

18  6  0. 


flLII 


r 


PREFACE, 


If  it  be  the  good  fortune  of  this  Work  to  possess  any  in- 
terest for  the  Novel  reader,  that  interest,  perhaps,  will  be 
but  little  derived  from  the  customary  elements  of  fiction. 
The  plot  is  extremely  slight ;  the  incidents  are  few,  and, 
with  the  exception  of  those  which  involve  the  fate  of  Viv- 
ian", such  as  may  be  found  in  the  records  of  ordinary  life. 

Eegarded  as  a  Novel,  this  attempt  is  an  experiment  some- 
what apart  from  the  previous  works  of  the  Author ;  it  is 
the  first  of  his  writings  in  which  Humour  has  been  employ- 
ed less  for  the  purpose  of  satire  than  in  illustration  of  ami- 
able characters  ; — it  is  the  first,  too,  in  which  man  has  been 
viewed  less  in  his  active  relations  with  the  world,  than  in 
his  repose  at  his  own  hearth  : — in  a  word,  the  greater  part 
of  the  canvass  has  been  devoted  to  the  completion  of  a  sim- 
ple Family  Pictuee.  And  thus,  in  any  appeal  to  the 
sympathies  of  the  human  heart,  the  common  household  af- 
fections occupy  the  place  of  those  livelier  or  larger  passions 
which  usually  (and  not  unjustly)  arrogate  the  foreground  in 
Eomantic  composition. 

In  the  Hero  whose  autobiography  connects  the  different 
characters  and  events  of  the  work,  it  has  been  the  Author's 
intention  to  imply  the  influences  of  Home  upon  the  con- 
duct and  career  of  youth ;  and  in  the  ambition  which  es- 
tranges Pisisteatus  for  a  time  from  the  sedentary  occupa- 
tions in  which  the  man  of  civilized  life  must  usually  serve 
his  apprenticeship  to  Fortune  or  to  Fame,  it  is  not  designed 
to  describe  the  fever  of  Grenius  conscious  of  superior  powers 
and  aspiring  to  high  destinies,  but  the  natural  tendencies  of 


IV  PBBFA(  !.. 

a  fresh  and  buoyant  mind,  rather  vigorous  than  contempla- 
tive and  in  which  the  desire  of  action  is  but  the  symptom 
of  health. 

PlSlSTRATUS,  in  this  respect  (as  he  himself  feels  and  im- 
plies), becomes  the  specimen  or  type  of  a  class  the  numbers 
of  which  are  daily  increasing  in  the  inevitable  progress  of 
modern  civilization.  lie  is  one  too  many  in  the  midst  of 
the  crowd :  he  is  the  representative  of  the  exuberant  ener- 
gies of  youth,  turning,  as  with  the  instinct  of  nature  for 
space  and  development,  from  the  Old  World  to  the  New. 
That  which  may  be  called  the  interior  meaning  of  the  whole 
is  sought  to  be  completed  by  the  inference  that,  whatever 
our  wanderings,  our  happiness  will  always  be  found  wuthin 
a  narrow  compass,  and  amidst  the  objects  more  immediately 
within  our  reach ;  but  that  wre  are  seldom  sensible  of  this 
truth  (hackneyed  though  it  be  in  the  Schools  of  all  Philos- 
ophies) till  our  researches  have  spread  over  a  wider  area. 
To  insure  the  blessing  of  repose,  we  require  a  brisker  ex- 
citement than  a  few  turns  up  and  down  our  room.  Con- 
tent is  like  that  humour  in  the  crystal,  on  which  Clauclian 
has  lavished  the  wonder  of  a  child  and  the  fancies  of  a 
Poet— 

"Vivis  gemma  tumescit  aquis." 

E.  B.  L. 


THE    CAXTONS, 


PAET  FIRST. 

CHAPTER  I. 

"  Sir — sir,  it  is  a  boy !" 

"A  boy,"  said  my  father,  looking  up  from  his  book,  and 
evidently  much  puzzled  ;  "  what  is  a  boy  ?" 

Now  my  father  did  not  mean  by  that  interrogatory  to  chal- 
lenge philosophical  inquiry,  nor  to  demand  of  the  honest  but 
unenlightened  woman  who  had  just  rushed  into  his  study,  a  so- 
lution of  that  mystery,  physiological  and  psychological,  which 
has  puzzled  so  many  curious  sages,  and  lies  still  involved  in  the 
question,  "  What  is  man?"  For,  as  we  need  not  look  further 
than  Dr.  Johnson's  Dictionary  to  know  that  a  boy  is  "  a  male 
child" — i.  e.,  the  male  young  of  man  ;  so  he  who  would  go  to 
the  depth  of  things,  and  know  scientifically  what  is  a  boy,  must 
be  able  first  to  ascertain  "  what  is  a  man."  But,  for  aught  I 
know,  my  father  may  have  been  satisfied  with  Buffon  on  that 
score,  or  he  may  have  sided  with  Monboddo.  He  may  have 
agreed  with  Bishop  Berkeley — he  may  have  contented  himself 
with  Professor  Combe — he  may  have  regarded  the  genus  spir- 
itually, like  Zeno,  or  materially,  like  Epicurus.  Grant  that 
boy  is  the  male  young  of  man,  and  he  would  have  had  plenty 
of  definitions  to  choose  from.  He  might  have  said,  "  Man  is  a 
stomach — ergo,  boy  a  male  young  stomach.  Man  is  a  brain — 
boy  a  male  young  brain.  Man  is  a  bundle  of  habits — boy  a 
male  young  bundle  of  habits.  Man  is  a  machine — boy  a  male 
young  machine.  Man  is  a  tail-less  monkey — boy  a  male  young 
tail-less  monkey.  Man  is  a  combination  of  gases — boy  a  male 
young  combination  of  gases.  Man  is  an  appearance — boy  a 
male  young  appearance,"  &c,  &c,  and  et  cetera  ad  infinitum  ! 
And  if  none  of  these  definitions  had  entirely  satisfied  my  father, 
I  am  perfectly  persuaded  that  he  would  never  have  come  to 
Mrs.  Primmins  for  a  new  one. 


6  THE    CAXTON ^  ', 

But  it  so  happened  that  my  father  was  at  that  moment  en- 
gaged  in  the  important  consideration  whether  the  Iliad  was 
written  by  one  Homer — or  was  rather  a  collection  of  sundry 
ballads,  done  into  Greek  by  divers  hands,  and  finally  selected, 
compiled,  and  reduced  into  a  whole  by  a  Committee  of  Taste, 
under  that  elegant  old  tyrant  Pisistratus;  and  the  sudden  af- 
firmation, "It  is  a  boy !"  did  not  seem  to  him  pertinent  to  the 
thread  of  the  discussion.  Therefore  he  asked,  "What  is  a 
boy  ?" — vaguely,  and,  as  it  were,  taken  by  surprise. 

"Lord,  sir!"  said  Mrs.  Primmins,  "what  is  a  boy?  Why, 
the  baby!" 

"The  baby!"  repeated  my  father,  rising.  "What!  you 
don  t  mean  to  say  that  Mrs.  Caxton  is — eh — 1" 

"  Yes,  I  do,"  said  Mrs.  Primmins,  dropping  a  curtsy ;  "  and 
as  fine  a  little  rogue  as  ever  I  set  eyes  upon." 

"  Poor  dear  woman !"  said  my  father  with  great  compas- 
sion. "  So  soon,  too — so  rapidly !"  he  resumed  in  a  tone  of 
musing  surprise.  "Why,  it  is  but  the  other  day  we  were 
married." 

"  Bless  my  heart,  sir,"  said  Mrs.  Primmins,  much  scandal- 
ized, "  it  is  ten  months  and  more." 

"  Ten  months !"  said  my  father,  with  a  sigh.  "  Ten  months ! 
and  I  have  not  finished  fifty  pages  of  my  refutation  of  Wolfe's 
monstrous  theory !  In  ten  months  a  child ! — and  I'll  be  bound 
complete — hands,  feet,  eyes,  ears,  and  nose ! — and  not  like  this 
poor  Infant  of  mind  (and  my  father  pathetically  placed  his  hand 
on  the  treatise),  of  which  nothing  is  formed  and  shaped — not 
even  the  first  joint  of  the  little  finger !  Why,  my  wife  is  a 
precious  woman!  Well,  keep  her  quiet.  Heaven  preserve 
her,  and  send  me  strength — to  support  this  blessing!" 

"  But  your  honour  will  look  at  the  baby  ? — come,  sir !"  and 
Mrs.  Primmins  laid  hold  of  my  father's  sleeve  coaxinglv. 

"Look  at  it — to  be  sure,"  said  my  father  kindly;  "look  at 
it,  certainly ;  it  is  but  fair  to  poor  Mrs.  Caxton ;  after  taking 
-n  much  trouble,  dear  soul !" 

Therewith  my  father,  drawing  his  dressing-robe  round  him 
in  more  slately  folds,  followed  Mrs.  Primmins  up  stairs  into  a 
room  very  carefully  darkened. 

M  How  are  you,  my  dear?"  said  my  father  with  compassion- 
ate tenderness,  ae  hd  groped  his  way  to  the  bed. 

A  faint  voice  muttered,  "Better  no w,  and  so  happy!"    And, 


A    FAMILY    PICTUKE.  7 

at  the  same  moment,  Mrs.  Primmins  pulled  my  father  away, 
lifted  a  coverlid  from  a  small  cradle,  and,  holding  a  candle 
within  an  inch  of  an  undeveloped  nose,  cried  emphatically, 
" There—bless  it!" 

"  Of  course,  ma'am,  I  bless  it,"  said  my  father,  rather  peev- 
ishly. "  It  is  my  duty  to  bless  it ;  Bless  it  !  And  this,  then, 
is  the  way  we  come  into  the  world ! — red,  very  red, — blushing 
for  ail  the  follies  we  are  destined  to  commit." 

My  father  sat  down  on  the  nurse's  chair,  the  women  grouped 
round  him.  He  continued  to  gaze  on  the  contents  of  the  cra- 
dle, and  at  length  said  musingly: — "And  Homer  was  once 
like  this!" 

At  this  moment — and  no  wonder,  considering  the  propin- 
quity of  the  candle  to  his  visual  organs — Homer's  infant  like- 
ness commenced  the  first  untutored  melodies  of  nature. 

"Homer  improved  greatly  in  singing  as  he  grew  older," 
observed  Mr.  Squills,  the  accoucheur,  who  was  engaged  in 
some  mysteries  in  a  corner  of  the  room. 

My  father  stopped  his  ears : — "  Little  things  can  make  a 
great  noise,"  said  he  philosophically;  "and  the  smaller  the 
thing  the  greater  noise  it  can  make." 

So  saying,  he  crept  on  tiptoe  to  the  bed,  and  clasping  the 
pale  hand  held  out  to  him,  whispered  some  words  that  no 
doubt  charmed  and  soothed  the  ear  that  heard  them,  for  that 
pale  hand  was  suddenly  drawn  from  his  own  and  thrown  ten- 
derly round  his  neck.  The  sound  of  a  gentle  kiss  was  heard 
through  the  stillness. 

"  Mr.  Caxton,  sir,"  cried  Mr.  Squills,  in  rebuke,  "  you  agitate 
my  patient — you  must  retire." 

My  father  raised  his  mild  face,  looked  round  apologetically, 
brushed  his  eyes  with  the  back  of  his  hand,  stole  to  the  door, 
and  vanished. 

"I  think,"  said  a  kind  gossip  seated  at  the  other  side  of  my 
mother's  bed — "  I  think,  my  dear,  that  Mr.  Caxton  might  have 
shown  more  joy, — more  natural  feeling,  I  may  say, — at  the 
sight  of  the  baby :  and  such  a  baby !  But  all  men  are  just 
the  same,  my  dear — brutes — all  brutes,  depend  upon  it." 

"Poor  Austin  !"  sighed  my  mother  feebly — "how  little  you 
understand  him !" 

"And  now  I  shall  clear  the  room,"  said  Mr. Squills.  "Go 
to  sleep,  Mrs.  Caxtcn  " 


THE   CAXTON >  : 

"Mr.  S< juills,^  exclaimed  my  mother,  and  the  bed-curtains 
trembled,  "pray  Bee  that  Mr.  Caxton  does  not  set  himself  on 
fire; — and,  Mr.  Squills,  tell  him  not  to  be  vexed  and  miss  me, 
— I  shall  be  down  very  soon — sha'n't  I  ?" 

"If  you  keep  yourself  easy,  you  will,  ma'am." 

"Pray,  say  so  ; — and,  Primmins," — 

"  Yes,  ma'am." 

"  Every  one,  I  fear,  is  neglecting  your  master.  Be  sure, — 
(and  my  mother's  lips  approached  close  to  Mrs.  Primmins' 
car), — be  sure  that  you — air  his  nightcap  yourself." 

"Tender  creatures  those  women,"  soliloquized  Mr.  Squills, 
as,  after  clearing  the  room  of  all  present,  save  Mrs.  Primmins 
and  the  nurse,  he  took  his  way  toward  my  father's  study. 
Encountering  the  footman  in  the  passage, — "  John,"  said  he, 
"  take  supper  into  your  master's  room,  and  make  some  punch, 
will  you?— stiffish!" 


CHAPTER  II. 

"  Mr.  Caxton,  how  on  earth  did  you  ever  come  to  marry  ?" 
asked  Mr.  Squills,  abruptly,  with  his  feet  on  the  hob,  while 
stirring  up  his  punch. 

That  was  a  home  question,  which  many  men  might  reason- 
ably resent;  but  my  father  scarcely  knew  what  resentment 
was. 

"  Squills,"  said  he,  turning  round  from  his  books,  and  laying 
one  finger  on  the  surgeon's  arm  confidentially, — "  Squills," 
said  he,  "I  myself  should  be  glad  to  know  how  I  came  to  be 
married." 

Mr.  Squills  was  a  jovial,  good-hearted  man — stout,  fat,  and 
with  fine  teeth,  that  made  his  laugh  pleasant  to  look  at  as  well 
as  to  hear.  Mr.  Squills,  moreover,  was  a  bit  of  a  philosopher 
in  his  way; — studied  human  nature  in  curing  its  diseases;  and 
was  accustomed  to  say,  that  Mr.  Caxton  was  a  better  book  in 
himself  than  all  lie  had  in  his  library.  Mr.  Squills  laughed  and 
rubbed  his  hands. 

My  father  resumed  thoughtfully,  and  in  the  tone  of  one  who 
moralizes: — 

"There  are  three  great  events  in  life,  sir — birth,  marriage, 
and  death.     None  know  how  they  are  born,  i'^w  know  how 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  0 

they  die.     But  I  suspect  that  many  can  account  for  the  inter- 
mediate phenomenon — I  cannot." 

"  It  was  not  for  money, — it  must  have  been  for  love,"  ob- 
served Mr.  Squills ;  "  and  your  young  wife  is  as  pretty  as  she 
is  good." 

"  Ha !"  said  my  father,  "  I  remember." 

"  Do  you,  sir  ?"  exclaimed  Squills,  highly  amused.  "  How 
was  it  ?" 

My  father,  as  was  often  the  case  with  him,  protracted  his 
reply,  and  then  seemed  rather  to  commune  with  himself  than 
to  answer  Mr.  Squills. 

"  The  kindest,  the  best  of  men,"  he  murmured — "  Abyssus 
Emditionis :  and  to  think  that  he  bestowed  on  me  the  only 
fortune  he  had  to  leave,  instead  of  to  his  own  flesh  and  blood, 
Jack  and  Kitty.  All  at  least  that  I  could  grasp  deficiente 
manu,  of  his  Latin,  his  Greek,  his  Orientals.  What  do  I  not 
owe  to  him !" 

"  To  whom  ?"  asked  Squills.  "  Good  Lord,  what's  the  man 
talking  about  ?" 

"  Yes,  sir,"  said  my  father,  rousing  himself,  "  such  was  Giles 
Tibbets,  M.A.,  Sol  Scientiarum,  tutor  to  the  humble  scholar 
you  address,  and  father  to  poor  Kitty.  He  left  me  his  Elze- 
virs ;  he  left  me  also  his  orphan  daughter." 

"  Oh !  as  a  wife—" 

"  No,  as  a  ward.  So  she  came  to  live  in  my  house.  I  am 
sure  there  was  no  harm  in  it.  But  my  neighbors  said  there 
was,  and  the  widow  Weltraum  told  me  the  girl's  character 
would  suffer.  What  could  I  do  ? — Oh  yes,  I  recollect  all  now ! 
I  married  her,  that  my  old  friend's  child  might  have  a  roof  to 
her  head,  and  come  to  no  harm.  You  see  I  was  forced  to  do 
her  that  injury ;  for,  after  all,  poor  young  creature,  it  was  a 
sad  lot  for  her.  A  dull  bookworm  like  me — cochlem  vitam 
agens,  Mr.  Squills — leading  the  life  of  a  snail.  But  my  shell 
was  all  I  could  offer  to  my  poor  friend's  orphan." 

"  Mr.  Caxton,  I  honour  you,"  said  Squills  emphatically,  jump- 
ing up,  and  spilling  half  a  tumblerful  of  scalding  punch  over  my 
father's  legs.  "  You  have  a  heart,  sir  ;  and  I  understand  why 
your  wife  loves  you.  You  seem  a  cold  man;  but  you  have 
tears  in  your  eyes  at  this  moment." 

"  I  dare  say  I  have,"  said  my  father,  rubbing  his  shins  :  "  it 
was  boiling !" 

A2 


10  THE   «   LXTONS  : 

w-  And  your  son  will  be  a  comfort  to  you  both,"  said  Mr. 
Squills,  reseating  himself,  and,  in  his  friendly  emotion,  wholly 
abstracted  from  all  consciousness  of  the  suffering  he  had  in- 
flicted.    u  lie  will  be  a  dove  of  peace  to  your  ark." 

"I  don't  doubt  it,"  said  my  father  ruefully;  "  only  those 
hen  they  are  small,  arc  a  very  noisy  sort  of  birds — non 
talium  avium  cantite  somnum  reducent.  However,  it  might 
have  been  worse.     Leda  had.  twins." 

"So  had  Mrs.  Barnabas  last  week,"  rejoined  the  accoucheur. 
"Who  knows  what  may  be  in  store  for  you  yet?  Here's  a 
health  to  Master  Caxton,  and  lots  of  brothers  and.  sisters  to 
him!" 

"  Brothers  and  sisters  !  I  am  sure  Mrs.  Caxton  will  never 
think  of  such  a  thing,  sir,"  said  my  father  almost  indignantly. 
u  She's  much  too  good  a  wife  to  behave  so.  Once,  in  a  way, 
it  is  all  very  well ;  but  twice — and  as  it  is,  not  a  paper  in  its 
place,  nor  a  pen  mended  the  last  three  days  :  I,  too,  who  can 
only  write  '  euspide  duriitscidd? — and  the  baker  coming  twice 
to  me  for  his  bill  too  !  The  IlithyiaB  are  troublesome  deities, 
Mr.  Squills." 

"  Who  are  the  Ilithyire  ?"  asked  the  accoucheur. 

"  You  ought  to  know,"  answered  my  father,  smiling.  "The 
female  daemons  who  presided  over  the  Xeogilos  or  Xew-born. 
They  take  the  name  from  Juno.  See  Homer,  book  XI.  By- 
the-by,  will  my  Xeogilos  be  brought  up  like  Hector  or  Astya- 
nax — videlicet,  nourished  by  its  mother  or  by  a  nurse  ?" 

"Which  do  you  prefer,  Mr.  Caxton?"  asked  Mr.  Squills, 
breaking  the  sugar  in  his  tumbler.  "  In  this  I  always  deem  it 
my  duty  to  consult  the  wishes  of  the  gentleman." 

"A  nurse  by  all  means,  then,"  said  my  father.  "And  let 
her  carry  him  "/»>  hoVpo,  next  to  her  bosom.  I  know  all  that 
has  been  said  about  mothers  nursing  their  own  infants,  Mr. 
S.juills;  but  poor  Kitty  is  so  sensitive,  that  I  think  a  stout 
healthy  peasant  woman  will  be  the  best  for  the  boy's  future 
nerves,  and  his  mother's  nerves,  present  and  future,  too. 
Heigh-ho! — I  shall  miss  the  dear  woman  very  much;  when 

will  she  1"-  up,  Mr.  Squills  ?" 

•■  ( >li.  iii  less  than  a  fortnighl  I" 

'•And  then  the  Neogilos  shall  go  to  school!  vpokolpo — the 
nurse  with  him,  and  all  will  be  righl  again,"  said  my  father,  with 
a  look  of  sly  mysterious  humour,  which  was  peculiar  to  him. 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  11 

"  School !  when  he's  just  born  ?" 

k*  Can't  begin  too  soon,"  said  my  father  positively  ;  "  that's 
Helvetius'  opinion,  and  it  is  mine  too." 


CHAPTER  III. 

That  I  was  a  very  wonderful  child,  I  take  for  granted ;  but, 
nevertheless,  it  was  not  of  my  own  knowledge  that  I  came  into 
possession  of  the  circumstances  set  down  in  my  former  chap- 
ters. But  my  father's  conduct  on  the  occasion  of  my  birth 
made  a  notable  impression  upon  all  who  witnessed  it ;  and  Mr. 
Squills  and  Mrs.  Primmins  have  related  the  facts  to  me  suffi- 
ciently often  to  make  me  as  well  acquainted  with  them  as  those 
worthy  witnesses  themselves.  I  fancy  I  see  my  father  before 
me,  in  his  dark-gray  dressing-gown,  and  with  his  odd,  half-sly, 
half-iunocent  twitch  of  the  mouth,  and  peculiar  puzzling  look, 
from  two  quiet,  abstracted,  indolently  handsome  eyes,  at  the 
moment  he  agreed  with  Helvetius  on  the  propriety  of  sending 
me  to  school  as  soon  as  I  was  born.  Xobody  knew  exactly 
what  to  make  of  my  father — his  wife  excepted.  The  people 
of  Abdera  sent  for  Hippocrates  to  cure  the  supposed  insanity 
of  Democritus,  "  who  at  that  time,"  saith  Hippocrates  drily, 
"  was  seriously  engaged  in  philosophy."  That  same  people  of 
Abdera  would  certainly  have  found  very  alarming  symptoms 
of  madness  in  my  poor  father ;  for,  like  Democritus,  "  he  es- 
teemed as  nothing  the  things,  great  or  small,  in  which  the  rest 
of  the  world  were  employed."  Accordingly,  some  set  him 
down  as  a  sage,  some  as  a  fool.  The  neighbouring  clergy  re- 
spected him  as  a  scholar,  "  breathing  libraries  ;"  the  ladies  de- 
spised him  as  an  absent  pedant,  who  had  no  more  gallantry 
than  a  stock  or  a  stone.  The  poor  loved  him  for  his  charities, 
but  laughed  at  him  as  a  weak  sort  of  man,  easily  taken  in.  Yet 
the  squires  and  farmers  found  that,  in  their  own  matters  of  ru- 
ral business,  he  had  always  a  fund  of  curious  information  to  im- 
part ;  and  whoever,  young  or  old,  gentle  or  simple,  learned  or 
ignorant,  asked  his  advice,  it  was  given  with  not  more  humility 
than  wisdom.  In  the  common  affairs  of  life,  he  seemed  incapa- 
ble of  acting  for  himself;  he  left  all  to  my  mother ;  or,  if  taken 
unawares,  was  pretty  sure  to  be  the  dupe.  But  in  those  very 
affairs — if  another  consulted  him — his  eye  brightened,  his  brow 


1  2  Tin:  0AXT0NS  : 

cleared,  the  desire  of  serving  made  him  a  new  being:  cautions, 
profound,  practical.  Too  lazy  or  too  languid  where  only  his 
own  interests  were  at  Btak( — touch  his  benevolence,  and  all  the 

wheels  of  the  clockwork  felt  the  impetus  of  the  master-spring. 
No  wonder  that,  to  others,  the  nut  of  such  a  character  was 
hard  to  crack  !  But,  in  the  eyes  of  my  poor  mother,  Augustine 
(familiarly  Austin)  Caxton  was  the  best  and  the  greatest  of 
human  beings ;  and  she  ought  to  have  known  him  well,  for  she 
studied  him  with  her  whole  heart,  knew  every  trick  of  his  face, 
and,  nine  times  out  often,  divined  what  he  was  going  to  say 
before  he  opened  his  lips.  Yet  certainly  there  were  deeps  in 
his  nature  which  the  plummet  of  her  tender  woman's  wit  had 
never  sounded ;  and,  certainly,  it  sometimes  happened  that,  even 
in  his  most  domestic  colloquialisms,  my  mother  was  in  doubt 
whether  he  was  the  simple  straightforward  person  he  was  most- 
ly taken  for.  There  was,  indeed,  a  kind  of  suppressed,  subtle 
irony  about  him,  too  unsubstantial  to  be  popularly  called  hu- 
mour, but  dimly  implying  some  sort  of  jest,  which  he  kept  all 
to  himself;  and  this  was  only  noticeable  when  he  said  some- 
thing that  sounded  very  grave,  or  appeared  to  the  grave  very 
silly  and  irrational. 

That  I  did  not  go  to  school — at  least  to  what  Mr.  Squills 
understood  by  the  word  school — quite  so  soon  as  intended,  I 
need  scarcely  observe.  In  fact,  my  mother  managed  so  well 
— my  nursery,  by  means  of  double  doors,  was  so  placed  out  of 
hearing — that  my  father,  for  the  most  part,  was  privileged,  if 
he  pleased,  to  forget  my  existence.  He  was  once  vaguely  re- 
called to  it  on  the  occasion  of  my  christening.  Now,  my 
father  was  a  shy  man,  and  he  particularly  hated  all  ceremonies 
and  public  spectacles.  He  became  uneasily  aware  that  a  great 
ceremony,  in  which  he  might  be  called  upon  to  play  a  promi- 
nent part,  was  at  hand.  Abstracted  as  he  was,- and  conven- 
iently deaf  at  times,  he  had  heard  such  significant  whispers 
about  "taking  advantage  of  the  bishop's  being  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood," and  "twelve  new  jelly-glasses  being  absolutely 
wanted,"  as  to  assure  him  that  some  deadly  festivity  was  in 
the  wind.  And  when  the  question  of  godmother  and  godfather 
was  fairly  put  to  him,  coupled  with  the  remark  that  tliis  was  a 

line  opportunity  to  return  the  eivilities  of  the  neighbourhood, 
he  felt  that  a  strong  effort  :it  escape  was  the  only  thing  left. 
Accordingly,  having,  seemingly  without  listening,  heard  the 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  13 

day  fixed,  and  seen,  as  they  thought  without  observing,  the 
chintz  chairs  in  the  best  drawing-room  uncovered  (my  dear 
mother  was  the  tidiest  woman  in  the  world),  my  father  sud- 
denly discovered  that  there  was  to  be  a  great  book-sale  twenty 
miles  off,  which  would  last  four  days,  and  attend  it  he  must. 
My  mother  sighed;  but  she  never  contradicted  my  father, 
even  when  he  was  wrong,  as  he  certainly  was  in  this  case. 
She  only  dropped  a  timid  intimation  that  she  feared  "it  would 
look  odd,  and  the  world  might  misconstrue  my  father's  ab- 
sence— had  not  she  better  put  off  the  christening?" 

"  My  dear,"  answered  my  father,  "  it  will  be  my  duty,  by- 
and-by,  to  christen  the  boy — a  duty  not  done  in  a  day.  At 
present,  I  have  no  doubt  that  the  bishop  will  do  very  well 
without  me.  Let  the  day  stand,  or,  if  you  put  it  off,  upon  my 
word  and  honour  I  believe  that  the  wicked  auctioneer  will  put 
off  the  book-sale  also.  Of  one  thing  I  am  quite  sure,  that  the 
sale  and  the  christening  will  take  place  at  the  same  time." 

There  was  no  getting  over  this ;  but  I  am  certain  my  dear 
mother  had  much  less  heart  than  before  in  uncovering  the 
chintz  chairs  in  the  best  drawing-room.  Five  years  later  this 
would  not  have  happened.  My  mother  would  have  kissed  my 
father,  and  said  "  Stay,"  and  he  would  have  stayed.  But  she 
was  then  very  young  and  timid ;  and  he,  wild  man,  not  of  the 
Avoods,  but  the  cloisters,  nor  yet  civilized  into  the  tractabilities 
of  home.  In  short,  the  post-chaise  was  ordered  and  the  carpet- 
bag packed. 

"  My  love,"  said  my  mother,  the  night  before  this  Hegira, 
looking  up  from  her  work,  "  my  love,  there  is  one  thing  you 
have  quite  forgot  to  settle — I  beg  pardon  for  disturbing  you, 
but  it  is  important ! — baby's  name ;  sha'n't  we  call  him  Au- 
gustine ?" 

"  Augustine,"  said  my  father,  dreamily,  "  why  that  name's 
mine." 

"And  you  would  like  your  boy's  to  be  the  same?" 

"  No,"  said  my  father,  rousing  himself.  "  Nobody  would 
know  which  was  which.  I  should  catch  myself  learning  the 
Latin  accidence  or  playing  at  marbles.  I  should  never  know 
my  own  identity,  and  Mrs.  Primmins  would  be  giving  me 
pap." 

My  mother  smiled  ;  and  putting  her  hand,  which  was  a  very 
pretty  one,  on  my  father's  shoulder,  and  looking  at  him  tender- 


11  Tin:  »  anions: 

ly,  Bhe  said,  "There's  no  fear  of  mistaking  you  for  any  other, 
even  your  son,  dearest.    Mill,  if  you  prefer  another  name,  what 

shall  ii  be?" 

"  Samuel,"  said  my  father.     "Dr.  Parr's  name  is  Samuel." 
"La,  my  love!    Samuel  is  the  Ugliest   iianu — " 

My  father  did  not  hear  the  exclamation — lie  was  again  deep 
in  his  books  :  presently  he  started  up:—" Barnes  says  limner  is 
Solomon.    Read  Omeros  backwards,  in  the  Hebrew  manner — " 

"Yes,  my  love,"  interrupted  my  mother;  "but  baby's 
Christian  name?" 

"  Omeros — Soremo — Solemo — Solomo !" 

"Solonio!  shocking,"  said  my  mother. 

"  Shocking,  indeed,"  echoed  my  father ;  "  an  outrage  to  com- 
mon sense."  Then,  after  glancing  again  over  his  books,  he 
broke  out  musingly — "  But,  after  all,  it  is  nonsense  to  suppose 
that  Homer  was  not  settled  till  his  time." 

"  Whose  ?"  asked  my  mother  mechanically. 

My  father  lifted  up  his  finger. 

My  mother  continued,  after  a  short  pause,  "Arthur  is  a 
pretty  name.  Then  there's  William — Henry — Charles — Rob- 
ert.    What  shall  it  be,  love  ?" 

"  Pisistratus  ?"  said  my  father  (who  had  hung  fire  till  then), 
in  a  tone  of  contempt — "  Pisistratus,  indeed !" 

"Pisistratus!  a  very  fine  name,"  said  my  mother  joyfully — 
"  Pisistratus  Caxton.  Thank  you,  my  love :  Pisistratus  it 
shall  be." 

"Do  you  contradict  me?  Do  you  side  with  Wolfe  and 
Heyne,  and  that  pragmatical  fellow  Vico?  Do  you  mean  to 
say  thai  the  Rhapsochsts — " 

•■  N<>.  indeed,"  interrupted  my  mother.  "My  dear,  you 
frighten  me." 

My  father  sighed,  and  threw  himself  back  in  his  chair.  My 
mother  took  courage  and  resumed. 

"  Pisistratus  is  a  long  name  too!  Still  one  could  call  him 
Sisty." 

"Sisty,  Viator,"  muttered  my  father;  "that's  trite!" 

"  \'u.  Sisty  by  itself — short.     Thank  you,  my  dear." 

Pour  days   afterwards,  on  his  return  ii'oin   the  book-sale,  to 

my  father's  inexpressible  bewilderment, he  was  informed  that 
"  Pisistratus  was  growing  the  very  image  of  him." 

When  ai  length  the  good  man  was  made  thoroughly  aware 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  15 

of  the  fact  that  his  son  and  heir  boasted  a  name  so  memorable 
in  history  as  that  borne  by  the  enslaver  of  Athens  and  the  dis- 
puted arranger  of  Homer — and  it  was  asserted  to  be  a  name 
that  he  himself  had  suggested — he  was  as  angry  as  so  mild  a 
man  could  be.  "  But  it  is  infamous  !"  he  exclaimed.  "  Pisis- 
t  rat  us  christened !  Pisistratus  !  who  lived  six  hundred  years 
before  Christ  was  born.  Good  heavens,  madam !  you  have 
made  me  the  father  of  an  Anachronism." 

My  mother  burst  into  tears.  But  the  evil  was  irremediable. 
An  anachronism  I  was,  and  an  anachronism  I  must  continue 
to  the  end  of  the  chapter. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

"  Of  course,  sir,  you  will  begin  soon  to  educate  your  son 
yourself?"  said  Mr.  Squills. 

"  Of  course,  sir,"  said  my  father,  "  you  have  read  my  Mar- 
tinus  Scriblerus  ?" 

"  I  don't  understand  you,  Mr.  Caxton." 

"  Then  you  have  not  read  Martians  Scriblerus,  Mr.  Squills !" 

"  Consider  that  I  have  read  it,  and  what  then  ?" 

"  Why  then,  Squills,"  said  my  father  familiarly,  "  you  would 
know,  that  though  a  scholar  is  often  a  fool,  he  is  never  a  fool 
so  supreme,  so  superlative,  as  when  he  is  defacing  the  first  un- 
sullied page  of  the  human  history,  by  entering  into  it  the  com- 
monplaces of  his  own  pedantry.  A  scholar,  sir — at  least  one 
like  me — is  of  all  persons  the  most  unfit  to  teach  young  chil- 
dren. A  mother,  sir — a  simple,  natural,  loving  mother — is  the 
infant's  true  guide  to  knowledge." 

"  Egad,  Mr.  Caxton,  in  spite  of  Helvetius,  whom  you  quoted 
the  night  the  child  was  born — egad,  I  believe  you  are  right.*' 

"  I  am  sure  of  it,"  said  my  father ;  "  at  least  as  sure  as  a  poor 
mortal  can  be  of  anything.  I  agree  with  Helvetius,  the  child 
should  be  educated  from  its  birth  ;  but  how  ? — there  is  the  rub : 
send  him  to  school  forthwith !  Certainly,  he  is  at  school  al- 
ready with  the  two  great  teachers,  Xature  and  Love.  Observe, 
that  childhood  and  genius  have  the  same  master-organ  in  com- 
mon— inquisitiveness.  Let  childhood  have  its  way,  and  as  it 
began  where  genius  begins,  it  may  find  what  genius  finds.  A 
certain  Greek  writer  tells  us  of  some  man,  who,  in  order  to 


mi:   <  \vn>\>  : 

Bave  his  bees  a  troublesome  flight  to  Hymettus,  cut  their  wings, 
and  placed  before  them  the  finest  flowers  he  could  select.  The 
poor  bees  made  no  honey.  Now,  sir,ifl  were  to  teach  my 
boy,  I  should  l>e  cutting  his  wings,  and  giving  him  the  flowers 
he  should  find  himself.  Let  us  leave  Nature  alone  for  the  pres- 
ent, and  Nature's  loving  proxy,  the  watchful  mother." 

Therewith  my  father  pointed  to  his  heir  sprawling  on  the 
-ra--,  and  plucking  daisies  on  the  lawn  ;  while  the  young-  moth- 
er's voice  rose  merrily,  laughing  at  the  child's  glee. 

"I  shall  make  but  a  poor  bill  out  of  your  nursery,  I  see," 
said  Mr.  Squills. 

Agreeably  to  these  doctrines,  strange  in  so  learned  a  father, 
I  thrived  and  flourished,  and  learned  to  spell,  and  made  pot- 
hooks, under  the  joint  care  of  my  mother  and  Dame  Primmins. 
This  last  was  one  of  an  old  race  fast  dying  away — the  race  of 
old  faithful  servants — the  race  of  old  tale-telling  nurses.  She 
had  reared  my  mother  before  me:  but  her  affection  put  out 
new  flowers  for  the  new  generation.  She  was  a  Devonshire 
woman  —  and  Devonshire  women,  especially  those  who  have 
passed  their  youth  near  the  sea-coast,  are  generally  supersti- 
tious. She  had  a  wonderful  budget  of  fables.  Before  I  was 
six  years  old,  I  was  erudite  in  that  primitive  literature,  in  which 
the  legends  of  all  nations  are  traced  to  a  common  fountain  — 
JPuss  in  Boots,  Tom  Thumb,  JFbrtunio.  Jfbrtunatus,  Jack  the 
(i  hint  Killer — tales  like  proverbs,  equally  familiar,  under  differ- 
ent versions,  to  the  infant  worshippers  of  Budh  and  the  hardier 
children  of  Thor.  I  may  say,  without  vanity,  that  in  an  exam- 
inai  ion  in  those  venerable  classics  I  could  have  taken  honours ! 

My  dear  mother  had  some  little  misgivings  as  to  the  solid 
benefits  to  be  derived  from  such  fantastic  erudition,  and  timid- 
ly consulted  my  father  thereon. 

"  My  love,"  answered  my  father,  in  that  tone  of  voice  which 
always  puzzled  even  my  mother  to  be  sure  whether  he  was  in 
jesl  or  earnest — "in  all  these  fables,  certain  philosophers  could 
easily  discover  symbolical  significations  of  the  highest  morality. 
I  have  myself  written  a  treatise  to  prove  that  JJuss  hi  JBootsis 
an  allegory  upon  the  progress  of  the  human  understanding, 
having  iis  origin  in  the  mystical  schools  of  the  Egyptian  priests, 
and  evidently  an  illustration  of  the  worship  rendered  at  Thebes 
and  Memphis  io  those  feline  quadrupeds,  of  which  they  make 

both  religious  symbols  and  elaborate  mummies." 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  17 

"  My  dear  Austin,"  said  rny  mother,  opening  her  blue  eyes, 
"  you  don't  think  that  Sisty  will  discover  all  those  line  things 
in  Buss  in  Boots  /" 

"  My  dear  Kitty,1'  answered  my  father,  "  you  don't  think, 
when  you  were  good  enough  to  take  up  with  me,  that  you 
found  in  me  all  the  fine  things  I  have  learned  from  books. 
You  knew  me  only  as  a  harmless  creature,  who  was  happy 
enough  to  please  your  fancy.  By-and-by  you  discovered  that 
I  was  no  worse  for  all  the  quartos  that  have  transmigrated  into 
ideas  within  me — ideas  that  are  mysteries  even  to  myself.  If 
Sisty,  as  you  call  the  child  (plague  on  that  unlucky  anachro- 
nism !  which  you  do  well  to  abbreviate  into  a  dissyllable),  if 
Sisty  can't  discover  all  the  wisdom  of  Egypt  in  Fuss  in  Boots, 
what  then  ?  Puss  in  Boots  is  harmless,  and  it  pleases  his 
fancy.  All  that  wakes  curiosity  is  wisdom,  if  innocent  —  all 
that  pleases  the  fancy  now,  turns  hereafter  to  love  or  to  knowl- 
edge.    And  so,  my  dear,  go  back  to  the  nursery." 

But  I  should  wrong  thee,  O  best  of  fathers !  if  I  suffered  the 
reader  to  suppose,  that  because  thou  didst  seem  so  indifferent 
to  my  birth,  and  so  careless  as  to  my  early  teaching,  therefore 
thou  wert,  at  heart,  indifferent  to  thy  troublesome  Neogilos. 
As  I  grew  older,  I  became  more  sensibly  aware  that  a  father's 
eye  was  upon  me.  I  distinctly  remember  one  incident,  that 
seems  to  me,  in  looking  back,  a  crisis  in  my  infant  life,  as  the 
first  tangible  link  between  my  own  heart  and  that  calm  great 
soul. 

My  father  was  seated  on  the  lawn  before  the  house,  his  straw- 
hat  over  his  eyes  (it  was  summer),  and  his  book  on  his  lap. 
Suddenly  a  beautiful  delf  blue-and-white  flower-pot,  which  had 
been  set  on  the  window-sill  of  an  upper  story,  fell  to  the  ground 
with  a  crash,  and  the  fragments  spluttered  up  round  my  fa- 
ther's legs.  Sublime  in  his  studies  as  Archimedes  in  the  siege, 
he  continued  to  read;  Impavidum ferient  mince! 

"  Dear,  dear !"  cried  my  mother,  who  was  at  work  in  the 
porch,  "  my  poor  flower-pot  that  I  prized  so  much !  Who 
could  have  done  this  ?     Primmins,  Primmins !" 

Mrs.  Primmins  popped  her  head  out  of  the  fatal  window, 
nodded  to  the  summons,  and  came  down  in  a  trice,  pale  and 
breathless. 

"  Oh,"  said  my  mother,  mournfully,  "  I  would  rather  have 
lost  all  the  plants  in  the  greenhouse  in  the  great  blight  last 


1 8  THE    CAXTONS I 

May, — I  Mould  rather  the  best  tea-set  were  broken !  The  poor 
geranium  I  reared  myself,  and  the  dear,  dear  flower-pot  which 
.Mr.  Caxtoc  boughl  for  me  my  last  birthday!  That  naughty 
child  must  have  done  this  !" 

Mrs.  frimmins  was  dreadfully  afraid  of  my  father — why,  I 
know  not,  except  that  very  talkative  social  persons  are  usually 
afraid  of  very  silent  shy  ones.  She  cast  a  hasty  glance  at  her 
master,  who  was  beginning  to  evince  signs  of  attention,  and 
cried  promptly,  "  No,  ma'am,  it  was  not  the  dear  boy,  bless  his 
flesh,it  was  I!" 

"  You  ?  how  could  you  be  so  careless  ?  and  you  knew  how 
I  prized  them  both.     O  Primmins !" 

Primmins  began  to  sob. 

"  Don't  tell  fibs,  nursey,"  said  a  small  shrill  voice ;  and  Mas- 
ter Sisty  (coming  out  of  the  house  as  bold  as  brass)  continued 
rapidly — "  don't  scold  Primmins,  mamma :  it  was  I  who  push- 
ed out  the  flower-pot." 

"  Hush !"  said  nurse,  more  frightened  than  ever,  and  look- 
in  g  aghast  towards  my  father,  who  had  very  deliberately 
taken  off  his  hat,  and  was  regarding  the  scene  with  serious 
eyes  wide  awake. 

"  Hush  !  And  if  he  did  break  it,  ma'am,  it  was  quite  an  ac- 
cident. He  was  standing  so,  and  he  never  meant  it.  Did 
you,  master  Sisty  ?  Speak !  (this  in  a  whisper)  or  Pa  will  be 
so  angry." 

"  Well,"  said  my  mother,  "  I  suppose  it  was  an  accident ; 
take  care  in  future,  my  child.  You  are  sorry,  I  see,  to  have 
grieved  me.     There's  a  kiss ;  don't  fret." 

"  Xo,  mamma,  you  must  not  kiss  me ;  I  don't  deserve  it.  I 
pushed  out  the  flower-pot  on  purpose." 

"  Ha !  and  why  ?"  said  my  father,  walking  up. 

Mrs.  Primmins  trembled  like  a  leaf. 

"For  fun!"  said  I,  hanging  my  head  —  "just  to  see  how 
you'd  look,  papa;  and  that's  the  truth  of  it.  Now  beat  me, 
do  beat  me!" 

Mv  father  threw  his  book  fifty  yards  off,  stooped  down,  and 
caught  me  to  his  breast.  "Boy,"  he  said,  "you  have  done 
wrong:  you  shall  repair  it  by  remembering  all  your  life  that 
your  father  blessed  God  forgiving  him  a  son  who  spoke  truth 
in  Bpite  of  fear!  Oh!  Mrs.  Primmins,  the  next  fable  of  this 
kind  you  try  1<>  teach  him,  and  we  part  for  ever!" 


A    FAMILY    PICTUEE.  19 

From  that  time  I  first  date  the  hour  when  I  felt  that  I  loved 
my  father,  and  knew  that  he  loved  me  ;  from  that  time,  too,  he 
began  to  converse  with  me.  He  would  no  longer,  if  he  met 
me  in  the  garden,  pass  by  with  a  smile  and  nod ;  he  would 
stop,  put  his  book  in  his  pocket,  and  though  his  talk  was  often 
above  my  comprehension,  still  somehow  I  felt  happier  and  bet- 
ter, and  less  of  an  infant,  when  I  thought  over  it,  and  tried  to 
puzzle  out  the  meaning ;  for  he  had  a  way  of  suggesting,  not 
teaching — putting  things  into  my  head,  and  then  leaving  them 
to  work  out  their  own  problems.  I  remember  a  special  in- 
stance with  respect  to  that  same  flower-pot  and  geranium. 
Mr.  Squills,  who  was  a  bachelor,  and  well  to  do  in  the  world, 
often  made  me  little  presents.  Xot  long  after  the  event  I  have 
narrated,  he  gave  me  one  far  exceeding  in  value  those  usually 
bestowed  on  children, — it  was  a  beautiful  large  domino-box  in 
cut  ivory,  painted  and  gilt.  This  domino-box  was  my  delight. 
I  was  never  weary  of  playing  at  dominoes  with  Mrs.  Primmins, 
and  I  slept  with  the  box  under  my  pillow. 

"  Ah !"  said  my  father  one  day,  when  he  found  me  ranging 
the  ivory  parallelograms  in  the  parlour,  "  ah  !  you  like  that  bet- 
ter than  all  your  playthings,  eh  ?" 

"  O  yes,  papa." 

"  You  would  be  very  sorry  if  your  mamma  were  to  throw 
that  box  out  of  the  window  and  break  it  for  fun."  I  looked 
beseechingly  at  my  father,  and  made  no  answer. 

"But  perhaps  you  would  be  very  glad,"  he  resumed,  "if 
suddenly  one  of  those  good  fairies  you  read  of  could  change 
the  domino-box  into  a  beautiful  geranium  in  a  beautiful  blue- 
and-white  flower-pot,  and  you  could  have  the  pleasure  of  put- 
ting it  on  your  mamma's  window-sill." 

"  Indeed  I  would !"  said  I,  half-crying. 

"  My  dear  boy,  I  believe  you ;  but  good  wishes  don't  mend 
bad  actions — good  actions  mend  bad  actions." 

So  saying,  he  shut  the  door  and  went  out.  I  cannot  tell  you 
how  puzzled  I  was  to  make  out  what  my  father  meant  by  his 
aphorism.  But  I  know  that  I  played  at  dominoes  no  more 
that  day.  The  next  morning  my  father  found  me  seated  by 
myself  under  a  tree  in  the  garden ;  he  paused  and  looked  at 
me  with  his  grave  bright  eyes  very  steadily. 

"  My  boy,"  said  he,  "  I  am  going  to  walk  to (a  town 

about  two  miles  off),  will  you  come  ?   and,  by-the-by,  fetch 


20  Tin:   I   \\  rONS  : 

vour  domino-box  :  I  should  like  to  show  it  to  a  person  there." 
I  ran  in  for  the  box,  and,  not  a  little  proud  of  walking  with 
my  father  upon  the  high-road,  we  set  out. 

"  Papa,"  >aid  I  by  the  way,  "there  are  no  fairies  now." 

-What  then,  my  child?" 

"Why — how  then  can  my  domino-box  be  changed  into  a 
geranium  and  a  blue-and-white  floAver-pot?" 

••  My  dear,"  said  my  father,  leaning  his  hand  on  my  shoul- 
der, "  everybody  who  is  in  earnest  to  be  good,  carries  tAvo 
fairies  about  Avitli  him — one  here,"  and  he  touched  my  heart ; 
"and  one  here,"  and  he  touched  my  forehead. 

"I  don't  understand,  papa." 

"I  can  wait  till  you  do,  Pisistratus!     What  a  name!" 

ZNIy  father  stopped  at  a  nursery  gardener's,  and,  after  look- 
ing over  the  floAvers,  paused  before  a  large  double  geranium. 
••  Ah,  this  is  finer  than  that  which  your  mamma  was  so  fond 
of.     What  is  the  cost,  sir  ?" 

"  Only  Is.  6<7.,"  said  the  gardener. 

My  father  buttoned  up  his  pocket.  "I  can't  afford  it  to- 
day,*1 said  he  gently,  and  Ave  Avalked  out. 

On  entering  the  toAvn,  Ave  stopped  again  at  a  china-Avare- 
house.  "  Have  you  a  flower-pot  like  that  I  bought  some 
months  ago  ?  Ah,  here  is  one,  marked  3s.  6d.  Yes,  that  is 
the  priee.  Well,  when  your  mamma's  birth-day  comes  again, 
Ave  must  buy  her  another.  That  is  some  months  to  wait.  And 
Ave  can  wait,  Master  Sisty.  For  truth,  that  blooms  all  the 
year  round,  is  better  than  a  poor  geranium ;  and  a  word  that 
is  never  broken,  is  better  than  a  piece  of  delf." 

My  head,  which  had  drooped  before,  rose  again;  but  the 
rush  of  joy  at  my  heart  almost  stifled  me. 

"I  have  called  to  pay  your  little  bill,"  said  my  father,  enter- 
ing  the  shop  of  one  of  those  fancy  stationers  common  in  coun- 
try inw  us,  and  avIio  sell  all  kinds  of  pretty  toys  and  nick-nacks. 
"  And  by  the  way,"  he  added,  as  the  smiling  shopman  looked 
over  his  books  for  the  entry,  "I  think  my  little  boy  here  can 
show  you  :i  much  handsomer  specimen  of  French  workman- 
ship than  that  Avork-box  which  you  enticed  Mrs.  Caxton  into 
raffling  for,  last  winter.     Show  your  domino-box,  my  dear." 

I  produced  my  treasure,  and  the  shopman  A\as  liberal  in  his 
commendations.  "It  is  always  well,  my  boy,  to  know  whal 
a  thing  i-  worth,  in  case  one  wishes  to  part  with  it.     If  my 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  21 

young  gentleman  gets  tired  of  his  plaything,  what  will  you 
give  him  for  it  ?" 

"  Why,  sir,"  said  the  shopman,  "  I  fear  we  could  not  afford 
to  give  more  than  eighteen  shillings  for  it,  unless  the  young 
gentleman  took  some  of  these  pretty  things  in  exchange  !" 

"  Eighteen  shillings  !"  said  my  father ;  "you  would  give  that 
sum.  Well,  my  boy,  whenever  you  do  grow  tired  of  your 
box,  you  have  my  leave  to  sell  it." 

My  father  paid  his  bill  and  went  out.  I  lingered  behind  a 
few  moments,  and  joined  him  at  the  end  of  the  street. 

"Papa,  papa!"  I  cried,  clapping  my  hands,  "we  can  buy 
the  geranium — we  can  buy  the  flower-pot."  And  I  pulled  a 
handful  of  silver  from  my  pockets. 

"  Did  I  not  say  right  ?"  said  my  father,  passing  his  handker- 
chief over  his  eyes — "  You  have  found  the  two  fairies  !" 

Oh !  how  proud,  how  overjoyed  I  was,  when,  after  placing 
vase  and  flower  on  the  window-sill,  I  plucked  my  mother  by 
the  gown,  and  made  her  follow  me  to  the  spot. 

"  It  is  his  doing,  and  his  money !"  said  my  father ;  "  good 
actions  have  mended  the  bad. 

"  What !"  cried  my  mother,  when  she  had  learned  all ;  "  and 
your  poor  domino-box  that  you  were  so  fond  of!     We  will  go 
back  to-morrow,  and  buy  it  back,  if  it  costs  us  double." 
V    "  Shall  we  buy  it  back,  Pisistratus  ?"  asked  my  father. 

'  "  Oh  no — no — no  !  It  would  spoil  all,"  I  cried,  burying  my 
facevon  my  father's  breast. 

"  %Sj  wife,"  said  my  father,  solemnly,  "  this  is  my  first  les- 
son to  Vour  child — the  sanctity  and  the  happiness  of  self-sacrifice 
— undo  i  not  what  it  should  teach  to  his  dying  day." 


CHAPTER  V. 


When  I  w  as  between  my  seventh  and  my  eighth  year,  a 
change  came  over  me,  which  may  perhaps  be  familiar  to  the 
notice  of  those  parents  who  boast  the  anxious  blessing  of  an 
only  child.  The  ordinary  vivacity  of  childhood  forsook  me ; 
I  became  quiet,  sedat  e,  and  thoughtful.  The  absence  of  play- 
fellows of  my  own  age,  the  companionship  of  mature  minds, 
alternated  only  by  complete  solitude,  gave  something  preco- 
cious, whether  to  mv  imaa'in'ation  or  rav  reason.     The  wild 


22  in ! :  CAXT0N8 

fables  mattered  to  me  by  the  old  nurse  in  the  Bummer  twi- 
light, or  over  the  winter's  hearth — the  effort  made  by  my 
struggling  intellect  to  comprehend  the  grave,  sweet  wisdom 
of  my  father's  suggested  lessons — tended  to  feed  a  passion  for 
reverie,  in  which  all  my  faculties  strained  and  struggled,  as  in 
the  dreams  that  come  when  sleep  is  nearest  waking.     I  had 
learned  to  read  with  ease,  and  to  write  with  some  fluency,  and 
I  already  began  to  imitate,  to  reproduce.     Strange  tales,  akin 
to  those  I  had  gleaned  from  fairyland — rude  songs,  modelled 
from  such  verse-books  as  fell  into  my  hands,  began  to  mar  the 
contents  of  marbled-covered  pages,  designed  for  the  less  am- 
bitious purposes  of  round  text  and  multiplication.     My  mind 
was  yet  more  disturbed  by  the  intensity  of  my  home  affections. 
My  love  for  both  my  parents  had  in  it  something  morbid  and 
painful.     I  often  wept  to  think  how  little  I  could  do  for  those 
I  loved  so  well.     My  fondest  fancies  built  up  imaginary  diffi- 
culties for  them,  which  my  arm  was  to  smooth.     These  feel- 
ings, thus  cherished,  made  my  nerves   over-susceptible  and 
acute.     Nature  began  to  affect  me  powerfully ;  and  from  that 
affection  rose  a  restless  curiosity  to  analyze  the  charms  that 
so  mysteriously  moved  me  to  joy  or  awe,  to  smiles  or  tears. 
I  got  my  father  to  explain  to  me  the  elements  of  astronomy ; 
I  extracted  from  Squills,  who  was  an  ardent  botanist,  some^ 
of  the  mysteries  in  the  life  of  flowers.     But  music  became  m\ 
darling  passion.     My  mother  (though  the  daughter  of  a  grc  at 
scholar — a  scholar  at  whose  name  my  father  raised  his  lrat  if 
it  happened  to  be  on  his  head)  possessed,  I  must  own  it,  fairly, 
less  book-learning  than  many  an  humble  tradesman's  daughter 
can  boast  in  this  more  enlightened  generation;  but    she  had 
some  natural  gifts  which  had  ripened,  Heaven  knows  how ! 
into   womanly  accomplishments.     She   drew  with  ,  some  ele- 
gance, and  painl  ed  flowers  to  exquisite  perfection.      She  played 
(»n  more  than  one  instrument  with  more  than  bonding-school 
skill;  and  though  she  Bang  in  no  language  but/her  own,  few 
could   hear  her  sweet  voice  without  being  deeply  touched. 
Her  music,  her  songs,  had  a  wondrous  effect  on  me.    Thus, 
altogether,  a  kind  of  dreamy  yet  delightful  melancholy  seized 
upon  my  whole  being;  and  tliis  was  the  more  remarkable,  be. 
cause  coni  rary  to  my  early  temperami  -nt,  which  was  bold,  act- 
ive, and  hilarious.    The  change,  in  my  character  began  to  act 
upon  my  form.      From   a  robust  and  vigorous  infant,  I  grew 


A    FAMILY   PICTURE.  23 

into  a  pale  and  slender  boy.  I  began  to  ail  and  mope.  Mr. 
Squills  was  called  in. 

"  Tonics !"  said  Mr.  Squills ;  "  and  don't  let  him  sit  over  his 
book.  Send  him  out  in  the  air — make  him  play.  Come  here, 
my  boy — these  organs  are  growing  too  large ;"  and  Mr.  Squills, 
who  was  a  phrenologist,  placed  his  hand  on  my  forehead. 
"  Gad,  sir,  here's  an  ideality  for  you  ;  and,  bless  my  soul,  what 
a  constructiveness !" 

My  father  pushed  aside  his  papers,  and  walked  to  and  fro 
the  room  with  his  hands  behind  him ;  but  he  did  not  say  a 
word  till  Mr.  Squills  was  gone. 

"  My  dear,"  then  said  he  to  my  mother,  on  whose  breast  I 
was  leaning  my  aching  ideality — "  my  dear,  Pisistratus  must 
go  to  school  in  good  earnest." 

"  Bless  me,  Austin  ! — at  his  age  ?" 

"  He  is  nearly  eight  years  old." 

"  But  he  is  so  forward." 

"  It  is  for  that  reason  he  must  go  to  school." 

"  I  don't  quite  understand  you,  my  love.  I  know  he  is  get- 
ting past  me ;  but  you  are  so  clever — " 

My  father  took  my  mother's  hand — "  We  can  teach  him  noth- 
ing now,  Kitty.     We  send  him  to  school  to  be  taught — " 

"By  some  schoolmaster  who  knows  much  less  than  you 
do—" 

"  By  little  schoolboys,  who  will  make  him  a  boy  again,"  said 
my  father,  almost  sadly.  "  My  dear,  you  remember  that,  when 
our  Kentish  gardener  planted  those  filbert-trees,  and  when  they 
were  in  their  third  year,  and  you  began  to  calculate  on  what 
they  would  bring  in,  you  went  out  one  morning,  and  found  he 
had  cut  them  down  to  the  ground.  You  were  vexed,  and  ask- 
ed why.  What  did  the  gardener  say  ?  '  To  prevent  their 
bearing  too  soon.'  There  is  no  want  of  fruitfulness  here — put 
back  the  hour  of  produce,  that  the  plant  may  last." 

"  Let  me  go  to  school,"  said  I,  lifting  my  languid  head,  and 
smiling  on  my  father.  I  understood  him  at  once,  and  it  was  as 
if  the  voice  of  my  life  itself  answered  him. 


24  mi:  <  axtoxs  : 


CHAPTER  VI. 

A  feab  after  the  resolution  thus  come  to,  I  was  at  home  for 
the  holidays. 

"I  hope,"  said  my  mother,  "that  they  are  doing  Sisty  jus- 
tice. I  do  think  lie  is  not  nearly  so  quick  a  child  as  he  was 
before  he  went  to  school.  I  wish  you  would  examine  him, 
Austin." 

"  I  have  examined  him,  my  dear.  It  is  just  as  I  expected  ; 
and  I  am  quite  satisfied." 

"  What !  you  really  think  he  has  come  on  ?"  said  my  moth- 
er, joyfully. 

"  He  does  not  care  a  button  for  botany  now,"  said  Mr. 
Squills. 

"  And  he  used  to  be  so  fond  of  music,  dear  boy  !"  observed 
my  mother,  with  a  sigh.    "  Good  gracious !  what  noise  is  that  ?" 

"  Your  son's  pop-gun  against  the  window,"  said  my  father. 
"  It  is  lucky  it  is  only  the  window  ;  it  would  have  made  a  less 
deafening  noise,  though,  if  it  had  been  Mr.  Squills'  head,  as  it 
was  yesterday  morning." 

"  The  left  ear,"  observed  Squills  ;  "  and  a  very  sharp  blow  it 
was,  too.     Yet  you  are  satisfied,  Mr.  Caxton  ?" 

"  Yes  ;  I  think  the  boy  is  now  as  great  a  blockhead  as  most 
boys  of  his  age  arc,"  observed,  my  father  with  great  compla- 
cency. 

"  Dear  me,  Austin — a  great  blockhead  ?" 

"What  else  did  he  go  to  school  for?"  asked  my  father. 
And  observing  a  certain  dismay  in  the  face  of  his  female  audi- 
ence, and  a  certain  surprise  in  that  of  his  male,  he  rose  and 
tood  on  the  hearth,  with  one  hand  in  his  waistcoat,  as  was  his 
wont  when  about  to  philosophize  in  more  detail  than  was  usual 
to  him. 

"  .Mr.  Squills,"  said  he,  "you  have  had  great  experience  in 
families." 

"As  good  a  practice  as  any  in  the  county,"  said  Mr.  Squills 
proudly:  "more  than  I  can  manage.  1  shall  advertise  for  a 
partner." 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  25 

"  And,"  resumed  my  father,  "  you  must  have  observed  al- 
most invariably  that,  in  every  family,  there  is  what  father, 
mother,  uncle,  and  aunt,  pronounce  to  be  one  wonderful  child." 

"  One  at  least,"  said  Mr.  Squills,  smiling. 

"  It  is  easy,"  continued  my  father,  "  to  say  this  is  parental 
partiality, — but  it  is  not  so.  Examine  that  child  as  a  stranger, 
and  it  will  startle  yourself.  You  stand  amazed  at  its  eager  cu- 
riosity— its  quick  comprehension — its  ready  wit — its  delicate 
perception.  Often,  too,  you  will  find  some  faculty  strikingly 
developed ;  the  child  will  have  a  turn  for  mechanics,  perhaps, 
and  make  you  a  model  of  a  steam-boat — or  it  will  have  an  ear 
tuned  to  verse,  and  will  write  you  a  poem  like  that  it  has  got 
by  heart  from  'The  Speaker' — or  it  will  take  to  botany  (like 
Pisistratus),  with  the  old  maid  its  aunt — or  it  will  play  a  march 
on  its  sister's  pianoforte.  In  short,  even  you,  Squills,  will  de- 
clare that  it  is  really  a  wonderful  child." 

"Upon  my  word,"  said  Mr.  Squills,  thoughtfully,  "there's  a 
great  deal  of  truth  in  what  you  say.  Little  Tom  Dobbs  is  a 
wonderful  child — so  is  Frank  Stepington — and  as  for  Johnny 
Styles,  I  must  bring  him  here  for  you  to  hear  him  prattle  on 
Natural  History,  and  see  how  well  he  handles  his  pretty  little 
microscope." 

"  Heaven  forbid  !"  said  my  father.  "  And  now  let  me  pro- 
ceed. These  thaumota,  or  wonders,  last  till  when,  Mr.  Squills  ? 
— last  till  the  boy  goes  to  school,  and  then,  somehow  or  other, 
the  thaumata  vanish  into  thin  air,  like  ghosts  at  the  cockcrow. 
A  year  after  the  prodigy  has  been  at  the  academy,  father  and 
mother,  uncle  and  aunt,  plague  you  no  more  with  his  doings 
and  sayings  :  the  extraordinary  infant  has  become  a  very  or- 
dinary little  boy.     Is  it  not  so,  Mr.  Squills  ?" 

"  Indeed  you  are  right,  sir.  How  did  you  come  to  be  so  ob- 
servant ?  you  never  seem  to — " 

"  Hush !"  interrupted  my  father ;  and  then,  looking  fondly  at 
my  mother's  anxious  face,  he  said  soothingly, — "  Be  comforted : 
this  is  wisely  ordained — and  it  is  for  the  best." 

"  It  must  be  the  fault  of  the  school,"  said  my  mother,  shak- 
ing her  head. 

"It  is  the  necessity  of  the  school  and  its  virtue,  my  Kate. 
Let  any  one  of  these  wonderful  children — wonderful  as  you 
thought  Sisty  himself — stay  at  home,  and  you  will  see  its  head 
grow  bigger  and  bigger,  and  its  body  thinner  and  thinner — eh, 

B 


THE   I  a.vions. 

Mr,  Squills? — till  the  mind  take  all  nourishment  from  the  frame, 
ami  the  frame,  Ln  turn,  stint  or  make  sickly  the  mind.  You  Bee 
that  noble  oak  from  the  window.     If  the  Chinese  had  brought 

it  up,  it  would  have  been  a  tree  in  miniature  at  five  years  old, 
and  at  a  hundred,  you  would  have  set  it  in  a  flower-pot  on  your 
table, no  bigger  than  it  was  at  five — a  curiosity  for  its  maturi- 
ty at  one  age — a  show  for  diminutiveness  at  the  other.  X<> ! 
the  ordeal  for  talent  is  school;  restore  the  stunted  maimikin  to 
the  growing  child,  and  then  let  the  child,  if  it  can,  healthily, 
hardily,  naturally,  work  its  slow  way  up  into  greatness.  If 
greatness  be  denied  it,  it  will  at  least  be  a  man,  and  that  is 
better  than  to  be  a  little  Johnny  Styles  all  its  life — an  oak  in 
a  pill-box." 

At  that  moment  I  rushed  into  the  room,  glowing  and  pant- 
ing health  on  my  cheek — vigour  in  my  limbs — all  childhood  at 
my  heart.  "  Oh,  mamma,  I  have  got  up  the  kite — so  high  ! 
come  and  see.     Do  come,  papa." 

"  Certainly,"  said  my  father ;  "  only  don't  cry  so  loud — kites 
make  no  noise  in  rising  ;  yet,  you  see  how  they  soar  above  the 
world.  Come,  Kate.  -  Where  is  my  hat  ?  Ah — thank  you, 
my  boy." 

"  Kitty,"  said  my  father,  looking  at  the  kite,  which,  attached 
by  its  string  to  the  peg  I  had  stuck  into  the  ground,  rested 
calm  in  the  sky,  "  never  fear  but  what  our  kite  shall  fly  as  high ; 
only,  the  human  soul  has  stronger  instincts  to  mount  upward 
than  a  few  sheets  of  paper  on  a  framework  of  lath.  But,  ob- 
serve, that  to  prevent  its  being  lost  in  the  freedom  of  space,  we 
must  attach  it  lightly  to  earth ;  and  observe  again,  my  dear, 
that  the  higher  it  soars,  the  more  string  we  must  give  it." 


PAET  SECOND. 

CHAPTER  I. 

When  I  had  reached  the  age  of  twelve,  I  had  got  to  the 
head  of  the  preparatory  school  to  which  I  had  been  sent.  And 
having  thus  exhausted  all  the  oxygen  of  learning  in  that  little 
receiver,  my  parents  looked  out  for  a  wider  range  for  my  in- 
spirations. During  the  last  two  years  in  which  I  had  been  at 
school,  my  love  for  study  had  returned ;  but  it  was  a  vigorous, 
wakeful,  undreamy  love,  stimulated  by  competition,  and  ani- 
mated by  the  practical  desire  to  excel. 

My  father  no  longer  sought  to  curb  my  intellectual  aspir- 
ings. He  had  too  great  a  reverence  for  scholarship  not  to 
wish  me  to  become  a  scholar  if  possible  ;  though  he  more  than 
once  said  to  me  somewhat  sadly,  "  Master  books,  but  do  not 
let  them  master  you.  Read  to  live,  not  live  to  read.  One 
slave  of  the  lamp  is  enough  for  a  household :  my  servitude 
must  not  be  a  hereditary  bondage." 

My  father  looked  round  for  a  suitable  academy;  and  the 
fame  of  Dr.  Herman's  "Philhellenic  Institute"  came  to  his 
ears. 

Now,  this  Dr.  Herman  was  the  son  of  a  German  music- 
master,  who  had  settled  in  England.  He  had  completed  his 
own  education  at  the  University  of  Bonn ;  but  finding  learn- 
ing too  common  a  drug  in  that  market  to  bring  the  high  price 
at  which  he  valued  his  own,  and  having  some  theories  as  to 
political  freedom  which  attached  him  to  England,  he  resolved 
upon  setting  up  a  school,  which  he  designed  as  an  "  Era  in  the 
History  of  the  Human  Mind."  Dr.  Herman  was  one  of  the 
earliest  of  those  new-fashioned  authorities  in  education,  who 
have,  more  lately,  spread  pretty  numerously  amongst  us,  and 
would  have  given,  perhaps,  a  dangerous  shake  to  the  founda- 
tions of  our  great  classical  seminaries,  if  those  last  had  not 
very  wisely,  though  very  cautiously,  borrowed  some  of  the 
more  sensible  principles  which  lay  mixed  and  adulterated 
amongst  the  crotchets  and  chimeras  of  their  innovating  rivals 
and  assailants* 


I  in:   •  A.XTONSI 

Dr.  Herman  had  written  a  great  many  learned  works  against 
r\  ery  pre-existing  method  ofinstruction  :  that  which  had  made 
the  greatest  noise  was  upon  the  infamous  fiction  of  Spelling- 
Books:  "A  more  Lying,  roundabout,  puzzle-headed  delusion 
than  that  by  which  we  confuse  the  clear  instiucts  of  truth  in 
our  accursed  system  of  spelling,  M'as  never  concocted  by  the 
father  of  falsehood."  Such  was  the  exordium  of  this  famous 
treatise.  "  For  instance,  take  the  monosyllable  Cat.  What 
a  brazen  forehead  you  must  have,  when  you  say  to  an  infant, 
c,  a,  t, — spell  Cat  :  that  is,  three  sounds  forming  a  totally  op- 
posite compound — opposite  in  every  detail,  opposite  in  the 
whole  —  compose  a  poor  little  monosyllable,  which,  if  you 
would  but  say  the  simple  truth,  the  child  will  learn  to  spell 
merely  by  looking  at  it !  How  can  three  sounds,  which  run 
thus  to  the  ear,  see — eh — tee,  compose  the  sound  cat?  Don't 
they  rather  compose  the  sound  see-eh-te  or  ceaPyf  How  can  a 
system  of  education  nourish  that  begins  by  so  monstrous  a 
falsehood,  which  the  sense  of  hearing  suffices  to  contradict  ? 
Xo  wonder  that  the  horn-book  is  the  despair  of  mothers! 
From  this  instance  the  reader  will  perceive  that  Dr.  Herman, 
in  his  theory  of  education,  began  at  the  beginning ! — he  took 
the  bull  fairly  by  the  horns.  As  for  the  rest,  upon  a  broad 
principle  of  eclecticism,  he  had  combined  together  every  new 
patent  invention  for  youthful  idea-shooting.  He  had  taken  his 
trigger  from  Hofwyl ;  he  had  bought  his  wadding  from  Ham- 
ilton ;  he  had  got  his  copper-caps  from  Bell  and  Lancaster. 
The  youthful  idea !  he  had  rammed  it  tight ! — he  had  rammed 
it  loose ! — he  had  rammed  it  with  pictorial  illustrations ! — he 
had  rammed  it  with  the  monitorial  system ! — he  had  rammed 
it  in  every  conceivable  way,  and  Avith  every  imaginable  ram- 
rod ;  but  I  have  mournful  doubts  whether  he  shot  the  youth- 
ful idea  an  inch  farther  than  it  did  under  the  old  mechanism 
of  flint  and  steel!  Nevertheless,  as  Dr.  Herman  really  did 
teach  a  great  many  things  too  much  neglected  at  schools ;  as, 
besides  Latin  and  Greek,  he  taught  a  vast  variety  in  that  vague 
infinite  nowadays  called  "useful  knowledge;"  as  he  engaged 
lecturers  on  chemistry,  engineering,  and  natural  history;  as 
arithmetic  and  the  elements  of  physical  science  were  enforced 
with  zeal  and  care;  as  all  sm-is  of  gymnastics  were  intermin- 
gled with  the  sports  of  the  play-ground ; — so  the  youthful  idea, 
if  it  did  not  go  farther,  spread  its  shots  in  a  wider  direction ; 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  29 

and  a  boy  could  not  stay  there  five  years  without  learning 
something,  which  is  more  than  can  be  said  of  all  schools !  He 
learned  at  least  to  use  his  eyes,  and  his  ears,  and  his  limbs ; 
order,  cleanliness,  exercise,  grew  into  habits ;  and  the  school 
pleased  the  ladies  and  satisfied  the  gentlemen ;  in  a  word,  it 
thrived :  and  Dr.  Herman,  at  the  time  I  speak  of,  numbered 
more  than  one  hundred  pupils.  Now,  when  the  worthy  man 
first  commenced  the  task  of  tuition,  he  had  proclaimed  the 
humanest  abhorrence  to  the  barbarous  system  of  corporeal 
punishment.  But,  alas !  as  his  school  increased  in  numbers, 
he  had  proportionately  recanted  these  honourable  and  anti- 
birchen  ideas.  He  had,  reluctantly,  perhaps  —  honestly,  no 
doubt,  but  with  full  determination — come  to  the  conclusion 
that  there  are  secret  springs  which  can  only  be  detected  by 
the  twigs  of  the  divining-rod ;  and  having  discovered  with 
what  comparative  ease  the  whole  mechanism  of  his  little  gov- 
ernment could  be  carried  on  by  the  admission  of  the  birch- 
regulator,  so,  as  he  grew  richer,  and  lazier,  and  fatter,  the 
Philhellenic  Institute  spun  along  as  glibly  as  a  top  kept  in 
vivacious  movement  by  the  perpetual  application  of  the  lash. 

I  believe  that  the  school  did  not  suffer  in  reputation  from 
this  sad  apostasy  on  the  part  of  the  head  master;  on  the  con- 
trary, it  seemed  more  natural  and  English — less  outlandish  and 
heretical.  And  it  was  at  the  zenith  of  its  renown,  when,  one 
bright  morning,  with  all  my  clothes  nicely  mended,  and  a  large 
plum-cake  in  my  box,  I  was  deposited  at  its  hospitable  gates. 

Amongst  Dr.  Herman's  various  whimsicalities,  there  was  one 
to  which  he  had  adhered  with  more  fidelity  than  to  the  anti- 
corporeal  punishment  articles  of  his  creed ;  and,  in  fact,  it  was 
upon  this  that  he  had  caused  those  imposing  words,  "  Philhel- 
lenic Institute,"  to  blaze  in  gilt  capitals  in  front  of  his  academy. 
He  belonged  to  that  illustrious  class  of  scholars  who  are  now 
waging  war  on  our  popular  mythologies,  and  upsetting  all  the 
associations  which  the  Etonians  and  Harrovians  connect  with 
the  household  names  of  ancient  history.  In  a  word,  he  sought 
to  restore  to  scholastic  purity  the  mutilated  orthography  of 
Greek  appellatives.  He  was  extremely  indignant  that  little 
boys  should  be  brought  up  to  confound  Zeus  with  Jupiter, 
Ares  with  Mars,  Artemis  with  Diana — the  Greek  deities  with 
the  Roman  ;  and  so  rigidly  did  he  inculcate  the  doctrine  that 
these  two  sets  of  personages  were  to  be  kept  constantly  con- 


30  THE  CAXTONS  : 

tradistinguished  from  cadi  other,  that  his  cross-examinations 
kept  us  in  eternal  confusion. 

"  Vat,"  lie  would  exclaim,  to  some  new  boy  fresh  from  some 
grammar-school  on  the  Etonian  system — k>  Vat  do  yon  mean 
by  dranslating  Z<  us  Juniter  ?  Is  dat  amatory,  irascible,  cloud- 
compelling  god  of  Olympus,  vid  his  eagle  and  his  segis,  in  the 
smallest  degree  resembling  de  grave,  formal,  moral  Jupiter  Op- 
timus  Maximus  of  the  Roman  Capitol?  —  a  god,  Master  Simp- 
kins,  who  would  have  been  perfectly  shocked  at  the  idea  of 
running  after  innocent  Fraulein  dressed  up  as  a  swan  or  a  bull ! 
I  put  dat  question  to  you  vonce  for  all,  Master  Simpkins." 
..Master  Simpkins  took  care  to  agree  with  the  doctor.  "  And 
how  could  you,"  resumed  Dr.  Herman  majestically,  turning  to 
some  other  criminal  alumnus  —  "how  could  you  presume  to 
dranslate  de  Ares  of  Homer,  sir,  by  the  audacious  vulgarism 
Mars  ?  Ares,  Master  Jones,  who  roared  as  loud  as  ten  thou- 
sand men  when  he  was  hurt ;  or  as  you  vill  roar  if  I  catch  you 
calling  him  Mars  again  !  Ares,  who  covered  seven  plectra  of 
ground ;  confound  Ares,  the  man-slayer,  with  the  Mars  or  Ma- 
vors  whom  de  Romans  stole  from  de  Sabines !  Mars,  de  sol- 
emn and  calm  protector  of  Rome !  Master  Jones,  Master  Jones, 
you  ought  to  be  ashamed  of  yourself !"  And  then  waxing  en- 
thusiastic, and  warming  more  and  more  into  German  gutturals 
and  pronunciation,  the  good  Doctor  would  lift  up  his  hands, 
with  two  great  rings  on  his  thumbs,  and  exclaim — "  Und  Du  ! 
and  don,  Aphrodite;  dou,  whose  bert  de  seasons  velcomed ! 
dou,  who  didst  put  Atonis  into  a  coffer,  and  den  tid  durn  him 
into  an  anemone  ;  dou  to  be  called  Venus  by  dat  snivel-nosed 
little  Master  Budderfield!  Venus,  who  presided  over  Baum- 
gartena  and  funerals,  and  nasty  tinking  sewers!  Venus  Clo- 
acina — 0  mein  gott !  Come  here,  Master  Budderfield  ;  I  must 
flog  you  for  dat;  I  must  indeed, liddle  boy  !"  As  our  Philhel- 
lenic preceptor  carried  his  archasological  purism  into  all  Greek 
proper  names,  it  was  not  likely  that  my  unhappy  baptismal 
would  escape.  The  first  time  T  signed  my  exercise  I  wrote 
"  Pisistratus  Caxton"  in  my  besl  round  hand.  "And  dey  call 
your  baba  a  scholar !"  said  the  Doctor  contemptuously.  "  Your 
name,  sir,  i-  Greet ;  and,  as  Greek, you  vill  be  dood  enough  to 
write  it,  vith  vat  you  call  an  6  and  an  o — P,  E,  i,  s,  i,  s,  r,  R,  a,- 
i.  o,  9.  Vat  can  you  expect  for  to  come  to,  Master  Caxton,  if 
\  on  don't  pay  de  care  dat  is  proper  to  your  own  dood  name — 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  31 

de  <?,  and  de  o  ?    Ach !  let  me  see  no  more  of  your  vile  corrup- 
tions !     Mem  Gott !     Pi !  ven  de  name  is  Pei !" 

The  next  time  I  wrote  home  to  my  father,  modestly  imply- 
ing that  I  was  short  of  cash,  that  a  trap-bat  would  be  accept- 
able, and  that  the  favorite  goddess  amongst  the  boys  (whether 
Greek  or  Roman  was  very  immaterial)  was  Diva  Moneta,  I  felt 
a  glow  of  classical  pride  in  signing  myself  "  your  affectionate 
Peisistratos."  The  next  post  brought  a  sad  damper  to  my 
scholastic  exultation.     The  letter  ran  thus : — 

"  My  Dear  Sox, — I  prefer  my  old  acquaintances  Thucydides 
and  Pisistratus  to  Thoukudidcs  and  Peisistratos.  Horace  is  fa- 
miliar to  me,  but  Horatius  is  only  known  to  me  as  Codes.  Pi- 
sistratus can  play  at  trap-ball;  but  I  find  no  authority  in  pure 
Greek  to  allow  me  to  suppose  that  that  game  was  known  to 
Peisistratos.  I  should  be  too  happy  to  send  you  a  drachma  or 
so,  but  I  have  no  coins  in  my  possession  current  at  Athens  at 
the  time  when  Pisistratus  was  spelt  Peisistratos. 
"  Your  affectionate  father, 

"A.  Caxtox." 

Verily,  here  indeed  was  the  first  practical  embarrassment 
produced  by  that  melancholy  anachronism  which  my  father 
had  so  prophetically  deplored.  However,  nothiug  like  expe- 
rience to  prove  the  value  of  compromise  in  this  world !  Peisis- 
tratos continued  to  write  exercises,  and  a  second  letter  from 
Pisistratus  was  followed  by  the  trap-bat. 


CHAPTER  II. 

I  was  somewhere  about  sixteen,  when,  on  going  home  for 
the  holidays,  I  foimd  my  mother's  brother  settled  among  the 
household  Lares.  Uncle  Jack,  as  he  was  familiarly  called, 
was  a  light-hearted,  plausible,  enthusiastic,  talkative  fellow, 
who  had  spent  three  small  fortunes  in  trying  to  make  a  large 
one. 

Uncle  Jack  was  a  great  speculator;  but  in  all  his  specula- 
tions he  never  affected  to  think  of  himself, — it  was  always  the 
good  of  his  fellow-creatures  that  he  had  at  heart,  and  in  this 
ungrateful  world  fellow-creatures  are  not  to  be  relied  upon! 


32  THE   CAXTONS: 

On  coming  of  age,  he  Inherited  £6000  from  his  maternal 
grandfather.  Ii  seemed  to  him  then  tnat  his  fellow-creatures 
were  sadly  imposed  upon  by  t heir  tailors.  Those  ninth  parts 
of  humanity  notoriously  eked  out  their  fractional  existence  by 
asking  cine  times  too  much  for  the  clothing  which  civilization, 
and  perhaps  a  change  of  climate,  render  more  necessary  to  us 
than  to  our  predecessors,  the  Picts.  Out  of  pure  philanthropy, 
CTncle  .lack  started  a  "  Grand  National  Benevolent  Clothing 
Company"  which  undertook  to  supply  the  public  with  inex- 
pressibles of  the  best  Saxon  cloth  at  7s.  6d.  a-pair ;  coats,  super- 
fine, £l  ISs.l  and.  waistcoats  at  so  much  per  dozen.  They 
were  all  to  be  worked  off  by  steam.  Thus  the  rascally  tailors 
were  to  be  put  down,  humanity  clad,  and  the  philanthropists 
rewarded  (but  that  was  a  secondary  consideration)  with  a 
clear  return  of  thirty  per  cent.  In  spite  of  the  evident  chari- 
tableness of  this  Christian  design,  and  the  irrefragable  calcula- 
tions upon  which  it  was  based,  this  company  died  a  victim 
to  the  ignorance  and  unthankfulness  of  our  fellow-creatures. 
And  all  that  remained  of  Jack's  £6000  was  a  fifty-fourth  share 
in  a  small  steam-engine,  a  large  assortment  of  ready-made  pan- 
taloons, and  the  liabilities  of  the  directors. 

Uncle  Jack  disappeared,  and  went  on  his  travels.  The  same 
spirit  of  philanthropy  which  characterized  the  speculations  of 
his  purse  attended  the  risks  of  his  person.  Uncle  Jack  had  a 
natural  leaning  towards  all  distressed  communities:  if  any 
tribe,  race,  or  nation  was  down  in  the  world,  Uncle  Jack  threw 
himself  plump  in  the  scale  to  redress  the  balance.  Poles, 
Greeks  (the  last  were  then  fighting  the  Turks),  Mexicans, 
Spaniards — Uncle  Jack  thrust  his  nose  into  all  their  squabbles! 
— Heaven  forbid  I  should  mock  thee,  poor  Uncle  Jack !  for 
those  generous  predilections  towards  the  unfortunate;  only, 
whenever  a  nation  is  in  a  misfortune,  there  is  always  a  job  go- 
ing on  !  The  Polish  cause,  the  Greek  cause,  the  Mexican  cause, 
and  the  Spanish  cause,  are  necessarily  mixed  up  with  loans  and 
subscriptions.  These  Continental  patriots,  when  they  take  up 
the  sword  with  one  hand,  generally  contrive  to  thrust  the  oth- 
er hand  deep  into  their  neighbours'  breeches  pockets.  Uncle 
Jack  went  to  Greece,  thence  he  went  to  Spain,  thence  to  Mex- 
ico. No  doubl  he  was  of  greal  service  to  those  afflicted  popu- 
lations, for  he  came  hack  with  unanswerable  proof  of  their 

gratitude,  in  the  shape  of  £3000.     Shortly  after  this  appeared 


A    FAMILY    PICTUEE.  33 

a  prospectus  of  the  "  Xew,  Grand,  National,  Benevolent  Insur- 
ance Company,  for  the  Industrious  Classes."  This  invaluable 
document,  after  setting  forth  the  immense  benefits  to  society 
arising  from  habits  of  providence,  and  the  introduction  of  in- 
surance companies — proving  the  infamous  rate  of  premiums 
exacted  by  the  existent  offices,  and  their  inapplicability  to  the 
wants  of  the  honest  artisan,  and  declaring  that  nothing  but 
the  purest  intentions  of  benefiting  their  fellow-creatures,  and 
raising  the  moral  tone  of  society,  had  led  the  directors  to  insti- 
tute a  new  society,  founded  on  the  noblest  principles  and  the 
most  moderate  calculations — proceeded  to  demonstrate  that 
twenty-four  and  a  half  per  cent,  was  the  smallest  possible  re- 
turn the  shareholders  could  anticipate.  The  company  began 
under  the  fairest  auspices :  an  archbishop  was  caught  as  presi- 
dent, on  the  condition  always  that  he  should  give  nothing  but 
his  name  to  the  society.  Uncle  Jack  —  more  euphoniously 
designated  as  "  the  celebrated  philanthropist,  John  Jones  Tib- 
bets,  Esquire" — was  honorary  secretary,  and  the  capital  stated 
at  two  millions.  But  such  was  the  obtuseness  of  the  indus- 
trious classes,  so  little  did  they  perceive  the  benefits  of  sub- 
scribing one-and-ninepence  a-week  from  the  age  of  twenty-one 
to  fifty,  in  order  to  secure  at  the  latter  age  the  annuity  of  £18, 
that  the  company  dissolved  into  thin  air,  and  with  it  dissolved 
Uncle  Jack's  £3000.  Nothing  more  was  then  seen  or  heard 
of  him  for  three  years.  So  obscure  was  his  existence,  that  on 
the  death  of  an  aunt  who  left  him  a  small  farm  in  Cornwall,  it 
was  necessary  to  advertise  that  "If  John  Jones  Tibbets,  Esq., 
would  apply  to  Messrs.  Blunt  and  Tin,  Lothbury,  between  the 
hours  of  ten  and  four,  he  would  hear  of  something  to  his  ad- 
vantage." But,  even  as  a  conjuror  declares  that  he  will  call  the 
ace  of  spades,  and  the  ace  of  spades,  that  you  thought  you  had 
safely  under  your  foot,  turns  up  on  the  table — so  with  this  ad- 
vertisement suddenly  turned  up  Uncle  Jack.  With  inconceiv- 
able satisfaction  did  the  new  landowner  settle  himself  in  his 
comfortable  homestead.  The  farm,  which  was  about  two 
hundred  acres,  was  in  the  best  possible  condition,  and  saving- 
one  or  two  chemical  preparations,  which  cost  Uncle  Jack,  upon 
the  most  scientific  principles,  thirty  acres  of  buckwheat,  the 
ears  of  which  came  up,  poor  things,  all  spotted  and  speckled, 
as  if  they  had  been  inoculated  with  the  small-pox,  Uncle  Jack 
for  the  first  two  years  was  a  thriving  man.     Unluckilv,  how- 

B  2 


THE    CAXTONS: 

ever,  one  day  Uncle  Jack  discovered  a  coal-mine  in  a  beautiful 
field  of  Swedish  turnips;  in  another  week  the  house  was  full 
of  engineers  and  naturalists,  and  in  another  month  appeared, 
in  my  uncle's  besl  Btyle,  much  unproved  by  practice,  a  pro- 
spectus ofthe"Grand  National  anti-Monopoly  Coal  Company, 
instituted  on  behalf  of  the  poor  householders  of  London,  and 
against  the  Monster  Monopoly  of  the  London  Coal  Wharfs. 

"A  vein  <»f  the  finest  "coal  has  been  discovered  on  the  estates 
of  the  celebrated  philanthropist,  John  Jones  Tibbets,  Esq. 
This  new  vein,  the  Molly  Wheal,  having  been  satisfactorily 
tested  by  that  eminent  engineer,  Giles  Compass,  Esq.,  prom- 
ises an  inexhaustible  field  to  the  energies  of  the  benevolent 
and  the  wealth  of  the  capitalist.  It  is  calculated  that  the  best 
coals  may  be  delivered,  screened,  at  the  mouth  of  the  Thames, 
for  18*.  per  load,  yielding  a  profit  of  not  less  than  forty-eight 
per  cent,  to  the  shareholders.  Shares,  £50,  to  be  paid  iu  five 
instalments.  Capital  to  be  subscribed,  one  million.  For  shares, 
early  application  must  be  made  to  Messrs.  Blunt  and  Tin,  so- 
licitors, Lothbury." 

Here,  then,  was  something  tangible  for  fellow-creatures  to 
go  on — there  was  land,  there  was  a  mine,  there  was  coal,  and 
there  actually  came  shareholders  and  capital.  Uncle  Jack  was 
so  persuaded  that  his  fortune  was  now  to  be  made,  and  had, 
moreover,  so  great  a  desire  to  share  the  glory  of  ruining  the 
monster  monopoly  of  the  London  wharfs,  that  he  refused  a 
\ cry  large  offer  to  dispose  of  the  property  altogether,  remained 
chief  shareholder,  and  removed  to  London,  where  he  set  up  his 
carriage,  and  gave  dinners  to  his  fellow-directors.  For  no  less 
than  three  years  did  this  company  flourish,  having  submitted 
the  entire  direction  and  working  of  the  mines  to  that  eminent 
engineer,  Giles  Compass — twenty  per  cent,  was  paid  regularly 
by  that  gentleman  to  the  shareholders,  and  the  shares  were 
at  more  than  cent,  per  cent.,  when  one  bright  morning  Giles 
Compass,  Esq.,  unexpectedly  removed  himself  to  that  wider 
lidd  for  genius  like  his, the  United  States;  and  it  was  discov- 
ered that  the  mine  had  f«»r  more  than  a  year  run  itself  into  a 

greal  pit  of  water,  and  thai  Mr.  Compass  had  been  paying  the 
shareholders  <">ut  of  their  own  capital.  My  uncle  had  the  sat- 
isfaction this  time  of  being  mined  in  very  good  company; 
three  doctors  of  divinity,  two  county  members,  a  Scotch  lord, 

and   an   Easl    India  director,  were  all    in   the  same  boat — that 


A    FAMILY    PICTUKE.  35 

boat  which  went  down  with  the  coal-mine  into  the  great  wa- 
ter-pit ! 

It  was  just  after  this  event  that  Uncle  Jack,  sanguine  and 
light-hearted  as  ever,  suddenly  recollected  his  sister,  Mrs.  Cax- 
ton,  and  not  knowing  where  else  to  dine,  thought  he  would 
repose  his  limbs  under  my  father's  trabes  citrea,  which  the  in- 
genious W.  S.  Landor  opines  should  be  translated  "  mahog- 
any." You  never  saw  a  more  charming  man  than  Uncle  Jack. 
All  plump  people  are  more  popular  than  thin  ]:>eople.  There 
is  something  jovial  and  pleasant  in  the  sight  of  a  round  face! 
W  nat  conspiracy  could  succeed  when  its  head  was  a  lean  and 
hungry-looking  fellow  like  Cassius?  If  the  Roman  patriots 
had  had  Uncle  Jack  amongst  them,  perhaps  they  would  never 
have  furnished  a  tragedy  to  Shakespeare.  Uncle  Jack  was  as 
plump  as  a  partridge — not  unwieldy,  not  corpulent,  not  obese, 
not  "vastus"  which  Cicero  objects  to  in  an  orator — but  every 
crevice  comfortably  filled  up.  Like  the  ocean,  "  time  wrote 
no  wrinkles  on  his  glassy  (or  brassy)  brow."  His  natural  lines 
were  all  upward  curves,  his  smile  most  ingratiating,  his  eye  so 
frank,  even  his  trick  of  rubbing  his  clean,  well-fed,  English- 
looking  hands,  had  something  about  it  coaxing  and  debon- 
naire,  something  that  actually  decoyed  you  into  trusting  your 
money  into  hands  so  prepossessing.  Indeed,  to  him  might  be 
fully  applied  the  expression — "  Sedem  anima3  in  extremis  dig- 
itis  habet ;"  "  He  had  his  soul's  seat  in  his  finger-ends."  The 
critics  observe  that  few  men  have  ever  united  in  equal  perfec- 
tion the  imaginative  with  the  scientific  faculties.  "Happy 
he,"  exclaims  Schiller,  "who  combines  the  enthusiast's  warmth 
with  the  worldly  man's  light" — light  and  warmth,  Uncle  Jack 
had  them  both.  He  was  a  perfect  symphony  of  bewitching 
enthusiasm  and  convincing  calculation.  Dicreopolis  in  the 
Acharnenses,  in  presenting  a  gentleman  called  Nicharchus  to 
the  audience,  observes — "  He  is  small,  I  confess,  but  there  is 
nothing  lost  in  him ;  all  is  knave  that  is  not  fool."  Parodying 
the  equivocal  compliment,  I  may  say  that  though  Uncle  Jack 
was  no  giant,  there  was  nothing  lost  in  him.  Whatever  was 
not  philanthropy  was  arithmetic,  and  whatever  was  not  arith- 
metic was  philanthropy.  He  would  have  been  equally  dear  to 
Howard  and  to  Cocker.  Uncle  Jack  was  comely,  too — clear- 
skinned  and  florid,  had  a  little  mouth,  with  good  teeth,  wore 
no  whiskers,  shaved  his  beard  as  close  as  if  it  were  one  of  his 


3G  tiii:  «  anions  : 

grand  national  companies;  his  hair,  once  somewhat  sandy, 
was  now  rather  greyish,  which  increased  the  respectability  of 

his  appearance;  and  he  wore  it  flat  at  the  sides  and  raised  in 
a  peak  at  the  top;  his  organs  of  constructiveness  and  ideality 
were  pronounced  by  Mr.  Squills  to  be  prodigious,  and  those 
freely-developed  bumps  gave  great  breadth  to  his  forehead. 

Well  shaped,  too,  was  Uncle  Jack,  about  rive  feet  eight,  the 
proper  height  for  an  active  man  of  business.  He  wore  a  black 
coat ;  but  to  make  the  nap  look  the  fresher,  he  had  given  it 
the  relief  of  gilt  buttons,  on  which  were  wrought  a  small 
crown  and  anchor ;  at  a  distance  this  button  looked  like  the 
king's  button,  and  gave  him  the  air  of  one  who  has  a  place 
about  Court.  He  always  wore  a  white  neckcloth  without 
starch,  a  frill,  and  a  diamond  pin,  which  last  furnished  him 
with  observations  upon  certain  mines  of  Mexico,  which  he  had 
a  great,  but  hitherto  unsatisfied  desire  of  seeing  worked  by  a 
grand  Xational  United  Britons  Company.  His  waistcoat  of 
a  morning  was  pale  buff — of  an  evening  embroidered  velvet ; 
wherewith  were  connected  sundry  schemes  of  an  "association 
for  the  improvement  of  native  manufactures."  His  trousers, 
matutinally,  were  of  the  colour  vulgarly  called  "  blotting-paper ;" 
and  he  never  wore  boots,  which,  he  said,  unfitted  a  man  for 
exercise,  but  short  drab  gaiters  and  square-toed  shoes.  His 
watch-chain  was  garnished  with  a  vast  number  of  seals;  each 
seal,  indeed,  represented  the  device  of  some  defunct  company, 
and  they  might  be  said  to  resemble  the  scalps  of  the  slain, 
worn  by  the  aboriginal  Iroquois — concerning  whom,  indeed, 
he  had  once  entertained  philanthropic  designs,  compounded 
of  conversion  to  Christianity  on  the  principles  of  the  English 
Episcopal  Church,  and  of  an  advantageous  exchange  of  beav- 
er-skins  for  bibles,  brandy,  and  gunpowder. 

That  Uncle  Jack  should  win  my  heart  was  no  wonder ;  my 
mother's  he  had  always  won  from  her  earliest  recollection  of 
his  having  persuaded  her  to  let  her  greal  doll  (a  present  from 
her  godmother)  be  put  up  to  a  raffle  for  the  benefit  of  the 
chimney-sweepers.  "  So  like  him — so  good  !"  she  would  often 
say  pensively;  "they  paid  sixpence  a-piece  for  the  raffle — 
twenty  tickets,  and  the  doll  cost  62.  Nobody  was  taken  in, 
and  the  doll,  poor  thing  (it  had  such  bine  eyes!)  went  for  a 
quarter  of  its  value.  But  Jack  said  nobody  could  guess  what 
good  the   t.eii    shillings  did  to  the   chimney-sweepers.1'      Xatu- 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  37 

rally  enough,  I  say,  my  mother  liked  Uncle  Jack ;  but  my  father 
liked  him  quite  as  well,  and  that  was  a  strong  proof  of  my  un- 
cle's powers  of  captivation.  However,  it  is  noticeable  that 
when  some  retired  scholar  is  once  interested  in  an  active  man 
of  the  world,  he  is  more  inclined  to  admire  him  than  others  are. 
Sympathy  with  such  a  companion  gratifies  at  once  his  curios- 
ity and  his  indolence ;  he  can  travel  with  him,  scheme  with 
him,  fight  with  him,  go  with  him  through  all  the  adventures  of 
which  his  own  books  speak  so  eloquently,  and  all  the  time  nev- 
er stir  from  his  easy-chair.  My  father  said  "  that  it  was  like 
listening  to  Ulysses  to  hear  Uncle  Jack !"  Uncle  Jack,  too, 
had  been  in  Greece  and  Asia  Minor,  gone  over  the  site  of  the 
siege  of  Troy,  ate  figs  at  Marathon,  shot  hares  in  the  Pelopon- 
nesus, and  drank  three  pints  of  brown  stout  at  the  top  of  the 
Great  Pyramid. 

Therefore,  Uncle  Jack  was  like  a  book  of  reference  to  my  fa- 
ther. Verily  at  times  he  looked  on  him  as  a  book,  and  took 
him  down  after  dinner  as  he  would  a  volume  of  Dodwell  or 
Pausanias.  In  fact,  I  believe  that  scholars  who  never  move 
from  their  cells  are  not  the  less  an  eminently  curious,  bustling, 
active  race,  rightly  understood.  Even  as  old  Burton  saith  of 
himself — "  Though  I  live  a  collegiate  student,  and  lead  a  mo- 
nastic life,  sequestered  from  those  tumults  and  troubles  of  the 
world,  I  hear  and  see  what  is  done  abroad,  how  others  run, 
ride,  turmoil,  and  macerate  themselves  in  town  and  country  :" 
which  citation  sivfficeth  to  show  that  scholars  are  naturally  the 
most  active  men  of  the  world,  only  that  while  their  heads  plot 
with  Augustus,  fight  with  Julius,  sail  with  Columbus,  and 
change  the  face  of  the  globe  with  Alexander,  Attila,  or  Moham- 
med, there  is  a  certain  mysterious  attraction,  which,  our  im- 
proved knowledge  of  mesmerism  will  doubtless  soon  explain  to 
the  satisfaction  of  science,  between  that  extremer  and  antipodal 
part  of  the  human  frame,  called  in  the  vulgate  "the  seat  of 
honour,"  and  the  stuffed  leather  of  an  armed  chair.  Learning 
somehow  or  other  sinks  down  to  that  part  into  which  it  was 
first  driven,  and  produces  therein  a  leaden  heaviness  and 
weight,  which  counteract  those  lively  emotions  of  the  brain, 
that  might  otherwise  render  students  too  mercurial  and  agile 
for  the  safety  of  established  order.  I  leave  this  conjecture  to 
the  consideration  of  experimentalists  in  the  physics. 

I  was  still  more  dolio-hted  than  mv  father  with  Uncle  Jack. 


38  THE   CAXT0N8  : 

Be  was  full  of  amusing  tricks,  could  conjure  wonderfully,  make 
a  bunch  of  keys  dance  a  hornpipe,  and  if  ever  you  gave  him 
half-a-crown,  he  was  sure  to  turn  it  into  a  halfpenny.  Be  amis 
only  unsuccessful  in  turning  my  halfpence  into  halfcrowns. 

We  took  long  walks  together,  and  in  the  midst  of  his  most 
diverting  conversation  my  uncle  was  always  an  observer.  lie 
would  Btop  to  examine  the  nature  of  the  soil,  fill  my  pockets 
(not  his  own)  with  great  lumps  of  clay,  stones,  and  rubbish,  to 
analyze  when  he  got  home,  by  the  help  of  some  chemical  ap- 
paral  us  he  had  borrowed  from  Mr.  Squills.  He  would  stand  an 
hour  at  a  cottage  door,  admiring  the  little  girls  who  were  straw- 
platting,  and  then  walk  into  the  nearest  farm-houses,  to  BUggest 
the  feasibility  of  "  a  national  straw-plat  association."  All  this 
fertility  of  intellect  was,  alas!  wasted  in  that  "ingrata  terra" 
into  which  Uncle  Jack  had  fallen.  Xo  squire  could  be  per- 
suaded into  the  belief  that  his  mother-stone  was  pregnant  with 
minerals  ;  no  firmer  talked  into  weaving  straw-plat  into  a  pro- 
prietary association.  So,  even  as  an  ogre,  having  devastated 
the  surrounding  country,  begins  to  cast  a  hungry  eye  on  his 
own  little  ones,  Uncle  Jack's  mouth,  long  defrauded  of  juicier 
and  more  legitimate  morsels,  began  to  water  for  a  bite  of  my 
innocent  father. 


CHAPTER  III. 

At  this  time  we  were  living  in  what  may  be  called  a  very 
respectable  style  for  people  who  made  no  pretence  to  ostenta- 
tion. On  the  skirts  of  a  large  village  stood  a  square  red  brick 
house,  about  the  date  of  Queen  Anne.  Upon  the  top*  of  the 
house  was  a  balustrade;  why,  heaven  knows — for  nobody,  ex- 
cept our  great  tom-cat  Ralph,  ever  walked  upon  the  leads — but 
m>  it  was,  and  so  it  often  is  in  houses  from  the  time  of  Eliza- 
beth, yea,  even  to  that  of  Victoria.  This  balustrade  was  di- 
vided by  low  piers,  on  each  of  which  was  placed  a  round  ball. 
The  centre  of  the  house  was  distinguishable  by  an  architrave, 
in  the  shape  of  a  triangle,  under  which  was  a  niche,  probably 
meant  for  a  figure,  but  the  figure  was  nol  forthcoming.  Below 
this  was  the  window  (encased  with  carved  pilasters)  of  my 

mother's  little  sitting-room  ;   and  lower  still,  raised  on  a  flight 
of  sis  steps,  was  a  very  handsome-looking  door,  with  a  project- 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  39 

ing  porch.  All  the  windows,  with  smallish  panes  and  largish 
frames,  were  relieved  with  stone  copings  ; — so  that  the  house 
had  an  air  of  solidity,  and  well-to-do-ness  about  it — nothing 
tricky  on  the  one  hand,  nothing  decayed  on  the  other.  The 
house  stood  a  little  back  from  the  garden  gates,  which  were 
large,  and  set  between  two  piers  surmounted  with  vases. 
Many  might  object,  that  in  wet  weather  you  had  to  walk  some 
way  to  your  carriage  ;  but  we  obviated  that  objection  by  not 
keeping  a  Carriage.  To  the  right  of  the  house  the  enclosure 
contained  a  little  lawn,  a  laurel  hermitage,  a  square  pond,  a 
modest  greenhouse,  and  half-a-dozen  plots  of  mignonette,  heli- 
otrope, roses,  pinks,  sweet-william,  &c.  To  the  left  spread  the 
kitchen-garden,  lying  screened  by  espaliers  yielding  the  finest 
apples  in  the  neighbourhood,  and  divided  by  three  winding 
gravel  walks,  of  which  the  extremest  was  backed  by  a  wall, 
whereon,  as  it  lay  full  south,  peaches,  pears,  and  nectarines  sun- 
ned themselves  early  into  well-remembered  flavour.  This  walk 
was  appropriated  to  my  father.  Book  in  hand,  he  would,  on 
fine  days,  pace  to  and  fro,  often  stopping,  dear  man,  to  jot  down 
a  pencil-note,  gesticulate,  or  soliloquize.  And  there,  when  not 
in  his  study,  my  mother  would  be  sure  to  find  him.  In  these 
deambulations,  as  he  called  them,  he  had  geuerally  a  companion 
so  extraordinary,  that  I  expect  to  be  met  with  a  hillalu  of  in- 
credulous contempt  when  I  specify  it.  Xevertheless  I  vow  and 
protest  that  it  is  strictly  true,  and  no  invention  of  an  exagger- 
ating romancer.  It  happened  one  day  that  my  mother  had 
coaxed  Mr.  Caxton  to  walk  with  her  to  market.  By  the  way 
they  passed  a  sward  of  green,  on  which  sundry  little  boys  were 
engaged  upon  the  lapidation  of  a  lame  duck.  It  seemed  that 
the  duck  was  to  have  been  taken  to  market,  when  it  was  dis- 
covered not  only  to  be  lame,  but  dyspeptic ;  perhaps  some  weed 
had  disagreed  with  its  ganglionic  apparatus,  poor  thing.  How- 
ever that  be,  the  goodwife  had  declared  that  the  duck  was 
good  for  nothing ;  and  upon  the  petition  of  her  children,  it  had 
been  consigned  to  them  for  a  little  innocent  amusement,  and  to 
keep  them  out  of  harm's  way.  My  mother  declared  that  she 
never  before  saw  her  lord  and  master  roused  to  such  anima- 
tion. He  dispersed  the  urchins,  released  the  duck,  carried  it 
home,  kept  it  in  a  basket  by  the  fire,  fed  it  and  physicked  it  till 
it  'recovered ;  and  then  it  was  consigned  to  the  square  pond. 
But  lo  !  the  duck  knew  its  benefactor;  and  whenever  my  fa- 


40  Tin:  CAXTONS  : 

ther  appeared  outside  his  door,  it  would  catch  Bight  of  him, 
flap  from  the  pond,  gain  the  lawn,  and  hobble  after  him  (for  it 
never  quite  recovered  the  use  of  its  left  leg),  till  it  reached  the 
walk  by  the  peaches;  and  there  sometimes  it  would  sit, grave- 
ly watching  its  master's  deambulations ;  sometimes  stroll  by 
his  side,  and,  :it  all  events,  never  leave  him  till,  at  his  return 
home,  he  fed  it  with  his  own  hands  ;  and,  quacking  her  peace- 
ful adieus,  the  nymph  then  retired  to  her  natural  element. 

With  the  exception  of  my  mother's  favourite  morning-room, 
the  principal  sitting-rooms — that  is,  the  study,  the  dining-room, 
and  what  was  emphatically  called  "the  best  drawing-room," 
which  was  only  occupied  on  great  occasions,  looked  south. 
Tall  beeches,  firs,  poplars,  and  a  few  oaks  backed  the  house, 
and  indeed  surrounded  it  on  all  sides  but  the  south  ;  so  that  it 
was  well  sheltered  from  the  winter  cold  and  the  summer  heat. 
Our  principal  domestic,  in  dignity  and  station,  was  Mrs.  Prim- 
mins,  who  was  waiting  gentlewoman,  housekeeper,  and  tyran- 
nical dictatrix  of  the  whole  establishment.  Two  other  maids, 
a  gardener,  and  a  footman,  composed  the  rest  of  the  serving 
household.  Save  a  few  pasture-fields,  which  he  let,  my  father 
was  not  troubled  with  land.  His  income  was  derived  from  the 
interest  of  about  £15,000,  partly  in  the  three  per  cents.,  partly 
on  mortgage ;  and  what  with  my  mother  and  Mrs.  Primmins, 
this  income  always  yielded  enough  to  satisfy  my  father's  single 
hobby  for  books,  pay  for  my  education,  and  entertain  our  neigh- 
1  n  >urs,  rarely,  indeed,  at  dinner,  but  very  often  at  tea.  My  dear 
mother  boasted  that  our  society  was  very  select.  It  consisted 
chiefly  of  the  clergyman  and  his  family,  two  old  maids  who 
gave  themselves  great  airs,  a  gentleman  who  had  been  in  the 
East  India  service,  and  who  lived  in  a  large  white  house  at  the 
top  of  the  hill ;  some  half-a-dozen  squires  and  their  wives  and 
children;  Mr. Squills,  still  a  bachelor:  and  once  a-year  cards 
were  exchanged — and  dinners  too  —  with  certain  aristocrats 
who  inspired  my  mother  with  a  great  deal  of  unnecessary  awe; 
since  she  declared  they  were  the  most  good-natured,  easy  peo- 
ple in  the  world,  and  always  stuck  their  cards  in  the  most  con- 
si  licuous  part  of  the  looking-glass  frame  over  the  chimney-piece 
of  the  besl  drawing-room.  Tims  you  perceive  that  our  natural 
position  was  one  highly  creditable  to  us,  proving  the  soundness 
of  our  finances  and  i  lie  gentility  of  our  pedigree — of  which  last 
more  hereafter.     At  present  I  content-  myself  with  saying  on 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  41 

that  head,  that  even  the  proudest  of  the  neighbouring  squire- 
archs  always  spoke  of  us  as  a  very  ancient  family.  But  all  my 
father  ever  said  to  evince  pride  of  ancestry,  was  in  honour  of 
William  Caxton,  citizen  and  printer  in  the  reign  of  Edward  IV. 
— "  Clarum  et  venerabile  nomen !"  an  ancestor  a  man  of  letters 
might  be  justly  vain  of. 

"  Heus,"  said  my  father,  stopping  short,  and  lifting  his  eyes 
from  the  Colloquies  of  Erasmus, "  salve  multum,  jucundissime." 

Uncle  Jack  was  not  much  of  a  scholar,  but  he  knew  enough 
of  Latin  to  answer,  "  Salve  tantundem,  mi  frater. 

My  father  smiled  approvingly.  "  I  see  you  comprehend 
true  urbanity,  or  politeness,  as  we  phrase  it.  There  is  an  el- 
egance in  addressing  the  husband  of  your  sister  as  brother. 
Erasmus  commends  it  in  his  opening-  chapter,  under  the  head 
of  '  Salutandi  formula?.'  And,  indeed,"  added  my  father, 
thoughtfully, "  there  is  no  great  difference  between  politeness 
and  affection.  My  author  here  observes  that  it  is  polite  to  ex- 
press salutation  in  certain  minor  distresses  of  nature.  One 
should  salute  a  gentleman  in  yawning,  salute  him  in  hiccuping, 
salute  him  in  sneezing,  salute  him  in  coughing ;  and  that  evi- 
dently because  of  your  interest  in  his  health ;  for  he  may  dis- 
locate his  jaw  in  yawning,  and  the  hiccup  is  often  a  symptom 
of  grave  disorder,  and  sneezing  is  perilous  to  the  small  blood- 
vessels of  the  head,  and  coughing  is  either  a  tracheal,  bronch- 
ial, pulmonary,  or  ganglionic  affection." 

"  Very  true.  The  Turks  always  salute  in  sneezing,  and  they 
are  a  remarkably  polite  people,"  said  Uncle  Jack.  "  But,  my 
dear  brother,  I  was  just  looking  with  admiration  at  these  apple- 
trees  of  yours.  I  never  saw  finer.  I  am  a  great  judge  of  ap- 
ples. I  find,  in  talking  with  my  sister,  that  you  make  very  lit- 
tle profit  by  them.  That's  a  pity.  One  might  establish  a  cider 
orchard  in  this  county.  You  can  take  your  own  fields  in  hand ; 
you  can  hire  more,  so  as  to  make  the  whole,  say  a  hundred 
acres.  You  can  plant  a  very  extensive  apple-orchard  on  a 
grand  scale.  I  have  just  run  through  the  calculations ;  they  are 
quite  startling.  Take  40  trees  per  acre — that's  the  proper  av- 
erage— at  Is.  Qd.  per  tree;  4000  trees  for  100  acres,  £300  ;  la- 
bour of  digging,  trenching,  say  £10  an  acre — total  for  100  acres, 
£1000.  Pave  the  bottoms  of  the  holes  to  prevent  the  tap-root 
striking  down  into  the  bad  soil — oh,  I  am  very  close  and  care- 
ful, you  see,  in  all  minutiae  ! — always  was — pave  'em  with  rub- 


42  i  in:  <  \.\ TONS: 

bishancl  ./.  a  hole;  that  for  4000  trees  the  LOOacresis 

>,  Add  the  renl  of  the  land  at  SOs.an  acre,  £150.  And 
how  stands  the  totals1  Here  dncle  Jack  proceeded  rapidly 
ticking  off  the  items  with  his  lingers: — 

"Tires £300 

Labour L000 

Paving  lmks 100 

Kent 150 

Total £1550 

dual's  your  expense.  Mark. — Now  to  the  profit.  Orchards 
in  Kent  realize  £100  an  acre,  some  even  £150;  but  let's  be 
moderate,  say  only  £50  an  acre,  and  your  gross  profit  per  year, 
from  a  capital  of  £1550,  will  be  £5000 — £5000  a-year.  Think 
of  that,  brother  Caxton.  Deduct  10  per  cent.,  or  £500  a-year, 
f<  >r  gardeners'  wages,  manure,  etc.,  and  the  net  product  is  £4500. 
Your  fortune's  made,  man — it  is  made — I  wish  you  joy!"  and 
Uncle  Jack  rubbed  his  hands. 

"  Bless  me, father,"  said  eagerly  the  young  Pisistratus,  who 
had  swallowed  with  ravished  ears  every  syllable  and  figure  of 
this  inviting  calculation,  "  why,  we  should  be  as  rich  as  Squire 
Rollick ;  and  then,  you  know,  sir,  you  could  keej)  a  pack  of  fox- 
hounds." 

"  And  buy  a  large  library,"  added  Uncle  Jack,  with  more 
subtle  knowledge  of  human  nature  as  to  its  appropriate  tempt- 
ations.  "  There's  my  friend  the  archbishop's  collection  to  be 
sold." 

Slowly  recovering  his  breath,  my  father  gently  turned  his 
eyes  from  one  to  the  other;  and  then,  laying  his  left  hand  on 
my  head,  while  with  the  right  he  held  up  Erasmus  rebukingly 
1<>  Ohcle  dack,  said — 

ww  See  how  easily  you  can  sow  covetousness  and  avidity  in  the 
youthful  mind.     Ah, brother!" 

••  You  are'  too  severe,  sir.  See  how  the  dear  boy  hangs  his 
head!  Fie! — natural  enthusiasm  of  his  years — 'gay  hope  by 
fancy  fed,'  as  the  poet  says.  Why,  for  that  fine  boy's  sake, 
you  ought  not  to  lose  so  certain  an  occasion  of  wealth,  I  may 
say,  untold.  For,  observe,  you  will  form  a  nursery  of  crabs; 
each  year  you  go  on  grafting  and  enlarging  your  plantation, 
renting,  nay,  why  not  buying,  more  land?  Gad,  sir,  in  twenty 
years  you  might  coyer  half  the  country;  but  say  you  stop  short 
at  2000  acres,  why,  the  net  pi-ollt  is  £90,000  a-year.  A  duke's 
incoiix — a  duke's — and  going  a-begging, as  I  may  say." 


A   FAMILY   PICTUKE.  43 

"But  stop,"  said  I,  modestly;  "the  trees  don't  grow  in  a 
year.  I  know  when  our  last  apple-tree  was  planted — it  is  five 
years  ago — it  was  then  three  years  old,  and  it  only  bore  one 
half-bushel  last  autumn." 

"What  an  intelligent  lad  it  is! — Good  head  there.  Oh, 
he'll  do  credit  to  his  great  fortune,  brother,"  said  Uncle  Jack 
approvingly.  "  True,  my  boy.  But  in  the  meanwhile  we  could 
fill  the  ground,  as  they  do  hi  Kent,  with  gooseberries  and  cur- 
rants, or  onions  and  cabbages.  Nevertheless,  considering  we 
are  not  great  capitalists,  I  am  afraid  we  must  give  up  a  share 
of  our  profits  to  diminish  our  outlay.  So,  harkye,  Pisistratus 
— (look  at  him,  brother — simple  as  he  stands  there,  I  think  he 
is  born  with  a  silver  spoon  in  his  mouth) — harkye,  now  to  the 
mysteries  of  speculation.  Your  father  .shall  quietly  buy  the 
land,  and  then,  presto !  we  will  issue  a  prospectus,  and  start 
a  company.  Associations  can  wait  five  years  for  a  return. 
Every  year,  meanwhile,  increase  the  value  of  the  shares.  Your 
father  takes,  we  say,  fifty  shares  at  £50  each,  paying  only  an 
instalment  of  £2  a  share.  He  sells  thirty-five  shares  at  cent. 
per  cent.  He  keeps  the  remaining  fifteen,  and  his  fortune's 
made  all  the  same ;  only  it  is  not  quite  so  large  as  if  he  had 
kept  the  whole  concern  in  his  own  hands.  What  say  you 
now,  brother  Caxton  ?  '  Vlsne  edere  pomum  i5'  as  we  used  to 
say  at  school." 

"  I  don't  want  a  shilling  more  than  I  have  got,"  said  my 
father  resolutely.  "-My  wife  would  not  love  me  better ;  my 
food  would  not  nourish  me  more ;  my  boy  would  not,  hi  all 
probability,  be  half  so  hardy,  or  a  tenth  part  so  industrious ; 
and—" 

"  But,"  interrupted  Uncle  Jack,  pertinaciously,  and  reserving 
his  grand  argument  for  the  last,  "  the  good  you  would  confer 
on  the  community — the  progress  given  to  the  natural  produc- 
tions of  your  country,  the  wholesome  beverage  of  cider  brought 
within  cheap  reach  of  the  labouring  classes.  If  it  was  only  for 
your  sake,  should  I  have  urged  this  question?  should  I  now? 
is  it  my  character  ?  But  for  the  sake  of  the  public !  mankind ! 
of  our  fellow-creatures !  Why,  sir,  England  could  not  get  on 
if  gentlemen  like  you  had  not  a  little  philanthropy  and  specu- 
lation." 

"  Papas !"  exclaimed  my  father,  "  to  think  that  England  can't 
get  on  without  turning  Austin  Caxton  into  an  apple-merchant ! 


44  nil:  i  kXTONB  : 

My  dear  Jack,  listen.  You  remind  me  of  a  colloquy  in  this 
book;  wail  a  bit — hereil  is — Pamphagus  and  Cocles. — Codes 
recognizes  his  friend,  who  had  been  absent  for  many  years,  by 
his  eminent  and  remarkable  nose. — Pamphagus  Bays,  rather  ir- 
ritably, thai  he  is  not  ashamed  ofhis  uo.se.  'Ashamed  ofit! 
no  indeed,'  says  Cocles:  '  I  never  saw  a  nose  that  could  be  put 
i<-  >o  many  uses  !'  'Ha,'  says  Pamphagus  (whose  curiosity  is 
aroused),  'uses!  what  uses?'  Whereon  (lepidissime J rater /) 
Cocles,  witli  eloquence  as  rapid  as  yours,  runs  on  with  a  count- 
less list  of  the  uses  to  which  so  vast  a  development  of  the  organ 
can  be  applied.  'If  the  cellar  was  deep,  it  could  sniff  up  the 
wine  like  an  elephant's  trunk, — if  the  bellows  Avere  missing, 
it  could  blow  the  fire, — if  the  lamp  was  too  glaring,  it  could 
suffice  for  a  shade, — it  would  serve  as  a  speaking-trumpet  to  a 
herald, — it  could  sound  a  signal  of  battle  in  the  field, — it  would 
do  for  a  wedge  in  wood-cutting — a  spade  for  digging — a  scythe 
for  mowing — an  anchor  in  sailing ;  till  Pamphagus  cries  out, 
'  Lucky  dog  that  I  am  !  and  I  never  knew  before  what  a  useful 
]  liet-e  of  furniture  I  carried  about  with  me.'  "  My  father  paused 
and  strove  to  whistle,  but  that  effort  of  harmony  failed  him — 
and  he  added  smiling,  "  So  much  for  my  apple-trees,  brother 
John.  Leave  them  to  their  natural  destination  of  filling  tarts 
and  dumplings." 

L'ncle  Jack  looked  a  little  discomposed  for  a  moment ;  but 
he-  then  laughed  with  his  usual  heartiness,  and  saw  that  he  had 
not  yet  got  to  my  father's  blind  side.  I  confess  that  my  re- 
vered parent  rose  in  my  estimation  after  that  conference ;  and 
I  began  to  see  that  a  man  may  not  be  quite  without  common 
Bense,  though  he  is  a  scholar.  -Indeed,  whether  it  was  that 
L'ncle  Jack's  visit  acted  as  a  gentle  stimulant  to  his  relaxed 
faculties,  or  that  I,  now  grown  older  and  wiser,  began  to  see 
his  character  more  clearly,  I  date  from  those  summer  holidays 
the  commencement  of  that  familiar  and  endearing  intimacy 
which  ever  after  existed  between  my  father  and  myself,  often 
I  deserted  the  more  extensive  rambles  of  Uncle  Jack,  or  the 
greater  allurements  of  a  cricket-match  in  the  village,  or  a  day's 
fishing  in  Squire  Rollick's  preserves,  for  a  quiet  stroll  with  my 
father  by  the  old  peach-wall; — sometimes  silent,  indeed,  and 
already  musing  over  the  future, while  he  was  busy  with  the 
past,  hut  amply  rewarded  when,  suspending  his  lecture,  he 
would  pour  forth  hoards  of  varied  learning,  rendered  amusing 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  45 

by  his  quaint  comments,  and  that  Socratic  satire  which  only 
fell  short  of  wit  because  it  never  passed  into  malice.  At  some 
moments,  indeed,  the  vein  ran  into  eloquence ;  and  with  some 
fine  heroic  sentiment  in  his  old  books,  his  stooping  form  rose 
erect,  his  eye  flashed ;  and  you  saw  that  he  had  not  been  orig- 
inally formed  and  wholly  meant  for  the  obscure  seclusion  in 
which  his  harmless  days  now  wore  contentedly  away. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

"  Egad,  sir,  the  country  is  going  to  the  dogs !  Our  senti- 
ments are  not  represented  in  parliament  or  out  of  it.  The 
County  Mercury  has  ratted,  and  be  hanged  to  it !  and  now 
we  have  not  one  newspaper  in  the  whole  shire  to  express  the 
sentiments  of  the  respectable  part  of  the  community  ?" 

This  speech  was  made  on  the  occasion  of  one  of  the  rare 
dinners  given  by  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Caxton  to  the  grandees  of  the 
neighbourhood,  and  uttered  by  no  less  a  person  than  Squire 
Rollick,  of  Rollick  Hall,  chairman  of  the  quarter-sessions. 

I  confess  that  I  (for  I  was  permitted  on  that  first  occasion 
not  only  to  dine  with  the  guests,  but  to  outstay  the  ladies,  in 
virtue  of  my  growing  years,  and  my  promise  to  abstain  from 
the  decanters) — I  confess,  I  say,  that  I,  poor  innocent,  was 
puzzled  to  conjecture  what  sudden  interest  in  the  county  news- 
paper could  cause  Uncle  Jack  to  prick  up  his  ears  like  a  war- 
horse  at  the  sound  of  the  drum,  and  rush  so  incontinently 
across  the  interval  between  Squire  Rollick  and  himself,  but 
the  mind  of  that  deep  and  truly  knowing  man  was  not  to  be 
plumbed  by  a  chit  of  my  age.  You  could  not  fish  for  the  shy 
salmon  in  that  pool  with  a  crooked  pin  and  a  bobbin,  as  you 
would  for  minnows  ;  or,  to  indulge  in  a  more  worthy  illustra- 
tion, you  could  not  say  of  him,  as  St.  Gregory  saith  of  the 
streams  of  Jordan,  "  A  lamb  could  wade  easily  through  that 
ford." 

"Not  a  county  newspaper  to  adA'Ocate  the  rights  of — " 
here  my  uncle  stopped,  as  if  at  a  loss,  and  whispered  in  my 
ear,  "What  are  his  politics?"  "Don't  know,"  answered  I. 
Uncle  Jack  intuitively  took  down  from  his  memory  the  phrase 
most  readily  at  hand,  and  added,  with  a  nasal  intonation,  "  the 
rights  of  our  distressed  fellow-creatures  !" 


46  THE  CAXTONS: 

My  father  scratched  his  eyebrow  with  his  fore-finger,  as  lie 

was  apl  to  do  when  doubtful;  the  rest  of  the  company — a  si- 
lent Bel — Looked  up. 
"Fellow-creatures!"  said  Mr.Rollick— "fellow-fiddlesticks!" 

Undo  .I.uk  was  clearly  in  the  wrong  box.  He  drew  out  of 
it  cautiously — "I  mean,"  said  he,  "our  respectable  fellow- 
creatures;"  and  then  suddenly  it  occurred  to  him  that  a 
"  County  Mercury"  would  naturally  represent  the  agricultural 
interest,  and  that  if  Mr.  Rollick  said  that  the  "County  Mer- 
cury ought  to  be  hanged,"  he  was  one  of  those  politicians  who 
had  already  begun  to  call  the  agricultural  interest  "  a  Vam- 
pire." Flushed  with  that  fancied  discovery,  Uncle  Jack  rushed 
on,  intending  to  bear  along  with  the  stream,  thus  fortunately 
directed,  all  the  "rubbish"*  subsequently  shot  into  Covent 
Garden  and  Hall  of  Commerce. 

"  Yes,  respectable  fellow-creatures,  men  of  capital  and  enter- 
prise !  For  what  are  these  country  squires  compared  to  our 
wealthy  merchants?  What  is  this  agricultural  interest  that 
professes  to  be  the  prop  of  the  land  ?" 

"  Professes  !"  cried  Squire  Rollick — "  it  is  the  prop  of  the 
land ;  and  as  for  those  manufacturing  fellows  who  have  bought 
up  the  Mercury — " 

"Bought  up  the  Mercury,  have  they,  the  villains!"  cried 
Uncle  Jack,  interrupting  the  Squire,  and  now  bursting  into 
full  scent — "  Depend  upon  it,  sir,  it  is  a  part  of  a  diabolical 
system  of  buying  up,  which  must  be  exposed  manfully. — Yes, 
as  I  was  saying,  what  is  that  agricultural  interest  which  they 
desire  to  ruin  ?  which  they  declare  to  be  so  bloated — which 
they  call  'a  vampire!'  they  the  true  blood-suckers,  the  venom- 
ous millocrats !  Fellow-creatures,  sir  !  I  may  well  call  dis- 
tressed  fellow-creatures  the  members  of  that  much  suffering 
class  of  which  you  yourself  are  an  ornament.  "What  can  be 
mure  deserving  of  our  best  efforts  for  relief,  than  a  country 
gentleman  like  yourself,  we'll  say — of  a  nominal  £5000  a-year 
— compelled  to  keep  up  an  establishment,  pay  for  his  fox- 
hounds, support  the  whole  population  by  contributions  to  the 
poor-rates,  support  the  whole  church  by  tithes;  all  justice, 
jails,  and  prosecutions  by  the  county  rates — all  thoroughfares 
by  the  highway  rates — ground  down  by  mortgages,  Jews,  or 

*  u  We  talked  sad  rubbish  when  we  first  began,"  says  Mr.  Cobden  in  one 

-  !"  '  i 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  47 

jointures ;  having  to  provide  for  younger  children ;  enormous 
expenses  for  cutting  his  woods,  manuring  his  model  farm,  and 
fattening  huge  oxen  till  every  pound  of  flesh  costs  him  five 
pounds  sterling  in  oil-cake;  and  then  the  lawsuits  necessary 
to  protect  his  rights;  plundered  on  all  hands  by  poachers, 
sheep-stealers,  dog-stealers,  churchwardens,  overseers,  garden- 
ers, gamekeepers,  and  that  necessary  rascal,  his  steward.  If 
ever  there  was  a  distressed  fellow-creature  in  the  world,  it  is 
a  country  gentleman  with  a  great  estate." 

My  father  evidently  thought  this  an  exquisite  piece  of  ban- 
ter, for  by  the  corner  of  his  mouth  I  saw  that  he  chuckled 
inly. 

Squire  Rollick,  who  had  interrupted  the  speech  by  sundry 
approving  exclamations,  particularly  at  the  mention  of  poor- 
rates,  tithes,  county-rates,  mortgages,  and  poachers,  here  push- 
ed the  bottle  to  Uncle  Jack,  and  said,  civilly, — "There's  a 
great  deal  of  truth' in  what  you  say,  Mr.  Tibbets.  The  agri- 
cultural interest  is  going  to  ruin ;  and  when  it  does,  I  would 
not  give  that  for  Old  England !"  and  Mr.  Rollick  snapped  his 
finger  and  thumb.  "  But  what  is  to  be  done — done  for  the 
county  ?     There's  the  rub." 

"  I  was  just  coming  to  that,"  quoth  Uncle  Jack.  "  You  say 
that  you  have  not  a  county  paper  that  upholds  your  cause,  and 
denounces  your  enemies." 

"  Xot  since  the  Whigs  bought  the shire  Mercury." 

"  Why,  good  heavens !  Mr.  Rollick,  how  can  you  suppose 
that  you  will  have  justice  done  you,  if  at  this  time  of  day  you 
neglect  the  press  ?  The  press,  sir, — there  it  is — air  we  breathe ! 
What  you  want  is  a  great  national — no,  not  a  national — a 
peovixcial  proprietary  weekly  journal,  supported  liberally  and 
steadily  by  that  mighty  party  whose  very  existence  is  at  stake. 
Without  such  a  paper,  you  are  gone,  you  are  dead,  extinct,  de- 
funct, buried  alive ;  with  such  a  paper,  well  conducted,  well 
edited  by  a  man  of  the  world,  of  education,  of  practical  expe- 
rience in  agriculture  and  human  nature,  mines,  corn,  manure, 
insurances,  acts  of  parliament,  cattle-shows,  the  state  of  parties, 
and  the  best  interests  of  society — with  such  a  man  and  such 
a  paper,  you  will  carry  all  before  you.  But  it  must  be  done 
by  subscription,  by  association,  by  co-operation,  by  a  Grand 
Provincial  Benevolent  Agricultural  Anti-innovating  Society." 

"  Egad,  sir,  you  are  right !"  said  Mr.  Rollick,  slapping  his 


48  i  in:  «  \\ io\> : 

thigh  :  "and  I'll  ride  over  to  our  Lord-Lieutenant  to-morrow. 
Jlis  eldest  son  ought  to  carry  the  county." 

"  And  he  will,  if  you  encourage  the  press  and  set  up  a  jour- 
nal." Baid  dncle  .lack,  rubbing  his  hands,  and  then  gently 
Btretching  them  out,  and  drawing  them  gradually  together,  as 
if  he  were  already  enclosing  in  that  airy  circle  the  unsuspect- 
ing guineas  of  the  unborn  association. 

All  happiness  dwells  more  in  the  hope  than  the  possession; 
and  at  that  moment,  I  dare  be  sworn  that  Uncle  Jack  felt  a 
livelier  rapture,  circum  prcecordia,  warming  his  entrails,  and 
diffusing  throughout  his  whole  frame  of  five  feet  eight  the 
prophetic  glow  of  the  Magna  Diva  Monet  a,  than  if  he  had  en- 
joyed for  ten  years  the  actual  possession  of  King  Croesus's 
privy  purse. 

"  I  thought  LTnele  Jack  was  not  a  Tory,"  said  I  to  my  fa- 
ther the  next  day. 

My  father,  who  cared  nothing  for  politics,  opened  his  eyes. 

"  Are  you  a  Tory  or  a  Whig,  papa  ?" 

"  Urn,"  said  my  father — "  there's  a  great  deal  to  be  said  on 
both  sides  of  the  question.  You  see,  my  boy,  that  Mrs.Prim- 
mins  has  a  great  many  moulds  for  our  butter-pats ;  sometimes 
they  come  up  with  a  crown  on  them,  sometimes  with  the  more 
popular  impress  of  a  cow.  It  is  all  very  well  for  those  who 
dish  up  the  butter  lo  print  it  according  to  their  taste,  or  in 
proof  of  their  abilities  ;  it  is  enough  for  us  to  butter  our  bread, 
say  grace,  and  pay  for  the  dairy.     Do  you  understand  ?" 

"Not  a  bit,  sir.*" 

"  Your  namesake  Pisistratus  was  wiser  than  you,  then,"  said 
my  father.  "  And  now  let  us  feed  the  duck.  Where's  your 
uncle?" 

"  He  has  borrowed  Mr.  Squills'  mare,  sir,  and  gone  with 
Squire  Rollick  to  the  great  lord  they  were  talking  of." 

"  Oho  !"  said  my  father,  "  brother  Jack  is  going  to  print  his 
butter!" 

And  indeed  Uncle  Jack  played  his  cards  so  well  on  this  oc- 
casion, and  set  before  the  Lord-Lieutenant,  with  whom  he  had 
a  personal  interview,  so  line  a  prospectus,  and  so  nice  a  calcu- 
Lation,  that  before  my  holidays  were  over, he  was  installed  in 
a  very  handsome  oth'cc  in  the  county  town,  with  private  apart- 
ments Over  it,  and  a  salary  of  6500  a-year — for  advocating  the 
cause  of  his  distressed  fellow-creatures,  including  noblemen, 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  49 

squires,  yeomanry,  farmers,  and  all  yearly  subscribers  in  the 

New  Proprietary   Agricultural  Anti-ixxovating  

shire  Weekly  Gazette.  At  the  head  of  this  newspaper 
Uncle  Jack  caused  to  be  engraved  a  crown  supported  by  a 
flail  and  a  crook,  with  the  motto,  "  Pro  rege  et  grege :" — And 
that  was  the  way  in  which  Uncle  Jack  printed  his  pats  of 
butter. 


CHAPTER  Y. 

I  seemed  to  myself  to  have  made  a  leap  in  life  when  I  re- 
turned to  school.  I  no  longer  felt  as  a  boy.  Uncle  Jack,  out 
of  his  own  purse,  had  presented  me  with  my  first  pair  of  "Wel- 
lington boots ;  my  mother  had  been  coaxed  into  allowing  me 
a  small  tail  to  jackets  hitherto  tail-less  ;  my  collars,  which  had 
been  wont,  spaniel-like,  to  flap  and  fall  about  my  neck,  now, 
terrier-wise,  stood  erect  and  rampant,  encompassed  with  a  cir- 
cumvallation  of  whalebone,  buckram,  and  black  silk.  I  was,  in 
truth,  nearly  seventeen,  and  I  gave  myself  the  airs  of  a  man. 
Now,  be  it  observed,  that  that  crisis  in  adolescent  existence 
wherein  we  first  pass  from  Master  Sisty  into  Mr.  Pisistratus, 
or  Pisistratus  Caxton,  Esq. — wherein  we  arrogate,  and  with 
tacit  concession  from  our  elders,  the  long-envied  title  of  "young 
man" — always  seems  a  sudden  and  imprompt  upshooting  and 
elevation.  We  do  not  mark  the  gradual  preparations  thereto ; 
we  remember  only  one  distinct  period  in  which  all  the  signs 
and  symptoms  burst  and  effloresced  together;  Wellington 
boots,  coat  tail,  cravat,  down  on  the  upper  lip,  thoughts  on  ra- 
zors, reveries  on  young  ladies,  and  a  new  kind  of  sense  of 
poetry. 

I  began  now  to  read  steadily,  to  understand  what  I  did 
read,  and  to  cast  some  anxious  looks  toward  the  future,  with 
vague  notions  that  I  had  a  place  to  win  in  the  world,  and  that 
nothing  is  to  be  won  without  perseverance  and  labour ;  and  so 
I  went  on  till  I  was  seventeen,  and  at  the  head  of  the  school, 
when  I  received  the  two  letters  I  subjoin. 

1. — From  Augustine  Caxton,  Esq. 
"  My  dear  Son, — I  have  informed  Dr.  Herman  that  you  will 
net  return  to  him  afcer  the  approaching  holidays.     You  are 

C 


50  THE    <  AJCTONS  : 

old  enough  now  to  look  forward  to  the  embraces  of  our  be- 
loved Alma  Mater,  and  I  think  studious  enough  to  hope  for 
the  honours  she  bestow  s  od  her  worthier  sons.  You  are  already 
entered  at  Trinity, — and  in  fancy  I  see  my  youth  return  to  me 
in  your  image.  I  see  you  wandering  where  the  Cam  steals  its 
way  through  those  noble  gardens;  and,  confusing  you  with 
myself,  I  recall  the  old  dreams  that  haunted  me  when  the 
chiming  bells  swung  over  the  placid  waters.  'Verum  secre- 
tumque  Mbusi  ion,  quam  multa  dictatis,  quam  multa  invenitis  !' 
There  at  that  illustrious  college,  unless  the  race  has  indeed  de- 
generated, you  will  measure  yourself  with  young  giants.  You 
will  see  those  who,  in  the  Law,  the  Church,  the  State,  or  the 
still  cloisters  of  Learning,  are  destined  to  become  the  eminent 
leaders  of  your  age.  To  rank  amongst  them  you  are  not  for- 
bidden to  aspire  ;  he  who  in  youth  '  can  scorn  delight,  and  love 
laborious  days,'  should  pitch  high  his  ambition. 

"  Your  L'ncle  Jack  says  he  has  done  wonders  with  his  news- 
paper,— though  Mr.  Rollick  grumbles,  and  declares  that  it  is 
full  of  theories,  and  that  it  puzzles  the  formers.  Uncle  Jack, 
in  reply,  contends  that  he  creates  an  audience,  not  addresses 
one, — and  sighs  that  his  genius  is  thrown  away  in  a  provincial 
town.  In  fact,  he  really  is  a  very  clever  man,  and  might  do 
much  in  London,  I  dare  say.  He  often  comes  over  to  dine  and 
sleep,  returning  the  next  morning.  His  energy  is  wonderful 
— and  contagious.  Can  you  imagine  that  he  has  actually  stir- 
red up  the  flame  of  my  vanity,  by  constantly  poking  at  the 
bars?  Metaphor  apart — I  find  myself  collecting  all  my  notes 
and  commonplaces,  and  wondering  to  see  how  easily  they  fall 
into  method,  and  take  shape  in  chapters  and  books.  I  can  not 
help  smiling  when  I  add  that  I  fancy  I  am  going  to  become  an 
author ;  and  smiling  more  when  I  think  that  your  Uncle  Jack 
should  have  provoked  me  into  so  egregious  an  ambition.  How- 
ever, I  have  read  some  passages  of  my  book  to  your  mother, 
and  she  says  'it  is  vastly  fine,'  which  is  encouraging.  Your 
mother  has  great  good  sense,  though  I  don't  mean  to  say  that 
she  has  much  learning — which  is  a  wonder,  considering  thai 
Pic  de  la  Mirandola  was  nothing  to  her  lather.  Yet  he  died, 
dear  great  man,  and  never  printed  a  line, — while  I — positively 

I  blush  to  think  of  my  temerity! 

••  \di<u.  my  bod  ;  make  the  best  use  ofthe  time  that  remains 
with  you  at  the  Philhellenic.     A  full  mind  ij  the  true  Pant  he- 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  51 

ism, plena  Jbvis.  It  is  only  in  some  corner  of  the  brain  which 
we  leave  empty  that  Vice  can  obtain  a  lodging.  When  she 
knocks  at  your  door,  my  son,  be  able  to  say,  '  No  room  for 
your  ladyship, — pass  on.'     Your  affectionate  father, 

"A.  Caxtox." 

2. — From:  Mrs.  Caxtox. 

"  My  dearest  Sisty, — You  are  coming  home  ! — My  heart  is 
so  full  of  that  thought  that  it  seems  to  me  as  if  I  could  not 
write  anything  else.  Dear  child,  you  are  coming  home ; — you 
have  done  with  school,  you  have  done  with  strangers — you  are 
our  own,  all  our  own  son  again  !  Y"ou  are  mine  again,  as  you 
were  in  the  cradle,  the  nursery,  and  the  garden,  Sisty,  when  we 
used  to  throw  daisies  at  each  other !  Y^ou  will  laugh  at  me 
so,  when  I  tell  you,  that  as  soon  as  I  heard  you  were  coming 
home  for  good,  I  crept  away  from  the  room,  and  went  to  my 
drawer  where  I  keep,  you  know,  all  my  treasures.  There  was 
your  little  cap  that  I  worked  myself,  and  your  little  nankeen 
jacket  that  you  were  so  proud  to  throw  off* — oh  !  and  many 
other  relics  of  you  when  you  were  little  Sisty,  and  I  was  not 
the  cold,  formal  '  Mother'  you  call  me  now,  but  dear  '  Mamma.' 
I  kissed  them,  Sisty,  and  said,  '  my  little  child  is  coming  back 
to  me  again !'  So  foolish  was  I,  I  forgot  all  the  long  years  that 
have  passed,  and  fancied  I  could  carry  you  again  in  my  arms, 
and  that  I  should  again  coax  you  to  say  '  God  bless  papa.' 
"Well,  well !  I  write  now  between  laughing  and  crying.  Y"ou 
cannot  be  what  you  were,  but  you  are  still  my  own  dear  son — 
your  father's  son — dearer  to  me  than  all  the  world — except 
that  father. 

"  I  am  so  glad,  too,  that  you  will  come  so  soon :  come  while 
your  father  is  really  warm  with  his  book,  and  while  you  can 
encourage  and  keep  him  to  it.  For  why  should  he  not  be 
great  and  famous  ?  Why  should  not  all  admire  him  as  we  do  ? 
YTou  know  how  proud  of  him  I  always  was ;  but  I  do  so  long- 
to  let  the  world  know  why  I  was  so  proud.  And  yet,  after 
all,  it  is  not  only  because  he  is  wise  and  learned, — but  because 
he  is  so  good,  and  has  such  a  large  noble  heart.  But  the  heart 
must  appear  in  the  book  too,  as  well  as  the  learning.  For 
though  it  is  full  of  things  I  don't  understand — every  now  and 
then  there  is  something  I  do  understand — that  seems  as  if  that 
heart  spoke  out  to  all  the  world. 


1 1 1 1     <   \  \  i « I  \  B  : 

"Your  ancle  has  undertaken  to  gel  it  }>ul >1is1hm1  ;  and  youi 
father  ia  going  up  to  town  with  him  about  it,  as  soon  as  the 
first  \  olume  is  finished. 

v-All  are  quite  well  exeepl  poor  Mrs.  Jones,  who  has  the 
agne  very  bad  indeed  ;  Primmins  lias  made  her  wear  a  charm 
for  it.  and  Mrs.  Jones  actually  declares  she  is  already  much 
better.  ( >ne  can't  deny  that  there  maybe  a  great  deal  in  such 
things,  though  it  seems  quite  against  the  reason.  Indeed  your 
father  Bays, '  Why  not?  A  charm  must  be  accompanied  by  a 
Btrong  wish  on  the  part  of  the  charmer  that  it  may  succeed, — 
and  what  is  magnetism  but  a  wish?'  I  don't  quite  compre- 
hend this  ;  but,  like  all  your  father  says,  it  has  more  thau  meets 
the  eye,  I  am  quite  sure. 

"  Only  three  weeks  to  the  holidays,  and  then  no  more  school, 
Sisty — no  more  school !  I  shall  have  your  room  all  done  fresh- 
ly, and  made  so  pretty;  they  are  coming  about  it  to-morrow! 

"  The  duck  is  quite  well,  and  I  really  don't  think  it  is  quite 
as  lame  as  it  was. 

"  God  bless  you,  dear,  dear  child.  Your  affectionate  happy 
mother.  K.  C." 

The  interval  between  these  letters  and  the  morning  on  which 
I  was  to  return  home  seemed  to  me  like  one  of  those  long,  rest- 
Less,  yet  hall-dreamy  days  which  in  some  infant  malady  I  had 
passed  in  a  sick-bed.  I  went  through  my  taskwork  mechan- 
ically, composed  a  Greek  ode  in  farewell  to  the  Philhellenic, 
which  Dr.  Herman  pronounced  a  chef  (Veen vre,  and  my  father, 
to  whom  I  sent  it  in  triumph,  returned  a  letter  of  false  English 
with  it,  that  parodied  all  my  Hellenic  barbarisms  by  imitating 
them  in  my  mother  tongue.  However,  I  swallowed  the  leek, 
and  consoled  myself  with  the  pleasing  recollection  that,  after 
sj (ending  six  years  in  learning  to  write  bad  Greek,  I  should 
never  have  any  farther  occasion  to  avail  myself  of  so  precious 
.•in  accomplishment. 

And  so  came  the  lasl  day.  Then  alone,  and  in  a  kind  of  de- 
lighted  melancholy,  I  revisited  each  of  the  old  haunts.  The 
robber's  cave  we  had  dug  one  winter,  and  maintained,  six  of 
us;  against  all  the  police  of  the  little  kingdom.  The  place  near 
the  pules  where  I  h:id  luii-lil  my  first  battle.  The  old  beech 
stump  ..n  which  1  sate  to  read  letters  from  home!      With  my 

knife,  rich  in  six  blades  (besides  a  cork-screw,  a  pen-picker,  and 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  53 

a  button-hook),  I  carved  my  name  in  large  capitals  over  my 
desk.  Then  night  came,  and  the  bell  rang,  and  we  vent  to 
our  rooms.  And  I  opened  the  window  and  looked  out.  I 
saw  all  the  stars,  and  wondered  which  was  mine  —  which 
should  light  to  fame  and  fortune  the  manhood  about  to  com- 
mence. Hope  and  Ambition  were  high  within  me ; — and  yet, 
behind  them,  stood  Melancholy.  Ah !  who  amongst  you,  read- 
ers, can  now  summon  back  all  those  thoughts,  sweet  and  sad 
— all  that  untold,  half-conscious  regret  for  the  past — all  those 
vague  longings  for  the  future,  which  made  a  poet  of  the  dullest 
on  the  last  night  before  leaving  boyhood  and  school  for  ever. 


PAET  THIED. 

CHAPTER  I. 

It  whs  a  beautiful  summer  afternoon  when  the  coach  set  me 
down  at  my  father's  gate.  Mrs.  Primmins  herself  ran  out  to 
welcome  me  ;  and  I  had  scarcely  escaped  from  the  warm  clasp 
of  her  friendly  hand  before  I  was  in  the  arms  of  my  mother. 

As  soon  as  that  tenderest  of  parents  was  convinced  that  I 
was  not  famished,  seeing  that  I  had  dined  two  hours  ago  at 
Dr.  Herman's,  she  led  me  gently  across  the  garden  towards 
the  arbour.  "  You  will  find  your  father  so  cheerful,"  said  she, 
wiping  away  a  tear.     "  His  brother  is  with  him." 

I  stopped.  Ills  brother !  Will  the  reader  believe  it  ? — I 
had  never  heard  that  he  had  a  brother,  so  little  were  family 
affairs  ever  discussed  in  my  hearing. 

"Ills  brother!"  said  I.  "Have  I  then  an  Uncle  Caxton  as 
well  as  an  Uncle  Jack?" 

w-  Vi *s,  my  love,"  said  my  mother.  And  then  she  added, 
'•  Your  father  and  he  were  not  such  good  friends  as  they 
ought  to  have  been,  and  the  Captain  has  been  abroad.  How- 
ever, thank  heaven  !  they  are  now  quite  reconciled." 

We  had  time  for  no  more — we  were  in  the  arbour.  There, 
a  table  was  spread  with  wine  and  fruit — the  gentlemen  were 
at  their  dessert;  and  those  gentlemen  were  my  father,  Uncle 
Jack,  Mr.  Squills,  and  —  tall,  lean,  buttoned-to-the-elhn  —  an 
erect,  martial,  majestic  and  imposing  personage,  who  seemed 
worthy  of  a  place  in  my  great  ancestor's  "Boke  of  Chivalrie." 

All  rose  as  I  entered  ;  but  my  poor  father,  who  was  always 
Blow  in  his  movements,  had  the  last  of  me.  Uncle  Jack  had 
left  the  very  powerful  impression  of  his  great  seal-ring  on  my 
fingers;  Mr.  Squills  had  patted  me  on  the  shoulder,  and  pro- 
nounced me  "  wonderfully  grown  ;"  my  new-found  relative  had 
with  great  dignity  said,  "Nephew,  your  hand,  sir — 1  am  Cap- 
1  -liii  do  Caxton  ;"   and  even  the  tamo  duck  had  taken  1km1  beak 

from  her  wing,  and  rubbed  it  gently  between  my  logs,  which 
was  her  usual  mode  of  salutation,  before  my  father  placed  his 
pale  hand  on  my  forehead,  and,  looking  :it  mo  for  a  moment 


THE    CAXTOXS.  55 

with  unutterable  sweetness,  said,  "  More  and  more  like  your 
mother — God  bless  you  !" 

A  chair  had  been  kept  vacant  for  me  between  my  father  and 
his  brother.  I  sat  down  in  haste,  and  with  a  tingling  colour 
on  my  cheeks  and  a  rising  at  my  throat,  so  much  had  the  un- 
usual kindness  of  my  father's  greeting  affected  me ;  and  then 
there  came  over  me  a  sense  of  my  new  position.  I  was  no 
longer  a  schoolboy  at  home  for  his  brief  holiday :  I  had  re- 
turned to  the  shelter  of  the  roof-tree  to  become  myself  one  of 
its  supports.  I  was  at  last  a  man,  privileged  to  aid  or  solace 
those  dear  ones  who  had  ministered,  as  yet  without  return,  to 
me.  That  is  a  very  strange  crisis  in  our  life  when  we  come 
home  "for  good."  Home  seems  a  different  thing:  before, 
one  has  been  but  a  sort  of  guest  after  all,  only  welcomed  and 
indulged,  and  little  festivities  held  in  honour  of  the  released 
and  happy  child.  But  to  come  home  for  good — to  have  done 
with  school  and  boyhood — is  to  be  a  guest,  a  child  no  more. 
It  is  to  share  the  every-day  life  of  cares  and  duties — it  is  to 
enter  into  the  confidences  of  home.  Is  it  not  so  ?  I  could 
have  buried  my  face  in  my  hands,  and  wept ! 

My  father,  with  all  his  abstraction  and  all  his  simplicity,  had 
a  knack  now  and  then  of  penetrating  at  once  to  the  heart.  I 
verily  believe  he  read  all  that  was  passing  in  mine  as  easily  as 
if  it  had  been  Greek.  He  stole  his  arm  gently  round  my 
waist  and  whispered,  "  Hush !"  Then  lifting  his  voice  he  cried 
aloud,  "  Brother  Roland,  you  must  not  let  Jack  have  the  best 
of  the  argument." 

"  Brother  Austin,"  replied  the  Captain,  very  formally,  "  Mr. 
Jack,  if  I  may  take  the  liberty  so  to  call  him." 

"  You  may  indeed,"  cried  Uncle  Jack. 

"  Sir,"  said  the  Captain,  bowing,  "  it  is  a  familiarity  that  does 
me  honour.  I  was  about  to  say  that  Mr.  Jack  has  retired  from 
the  field." 

"  Far  from  it,"  said  Squills,  dropping  an  effervescing  powder 
into  a  chemical  mixture  which  he  had  been  preparing  with 
great  attention,  composed  of  sherry  and  lemon-juice — "far 
from  it.  Mr.  Tibbets — whose  organ  of  combativeness  is  finely 
developed,  by-the-by — was  saying" — 

"  That  it  is  a  rank  sin  and  shame  in  the  nineteenth  century," 
quoth  Uncle  Jack,  "  that  a  man  like  my  friend  Captain  Cax- 
ton" — 


50  THE   CAXTONS  : 

«  />,  Caxton,  sir— - Mr.  Jack." 

M  De  CaxtOD — of  the  highest  military  talents,  of  the  most 
illustrious  descent — a  hero  sprung  from  heroes — should  have 

Berved  SO  many  years,  ami  with  such  distinction,  in  his  .Majes- 
ty's service,  and  should  now  be  only  a  captain  on  half-pay. 

This,  1  say,  comes  of  the  infamous  system  of  purchase,  which 
sets  up  the  highest  honours  for  sale  as  they  did  in  the  Roman 
empire" — 

My  lather  pricked  up  his  ears;  but  Uncle  Jack  pushed  on 
1  afore  my  father  could  get  ready  the  forces  of  his  meditated 
interruption. 

"A  system  which  a  little  effort,  a  little  union,  can  so  easily 
terminate.  Yes,  sir," — and  Uncle  Jack  thumped  the  table,  and 
two  cherries  bobbed  up  and  smote  Captain  de  Caxton  on  the 
nos( — "yes,  sir,  I  will  undertake  to  say  that  I  could  put  the 
army  upon  a  very  different  footing.  If  the  poorer  and  more 
meritorious  gentlemen,  like  Captain  de  Caxton,  would,  as  I  was 
just  observing,  but  unite  in  a  grand  anti-aristocratic  associa- 
tion, each  paying  a  small  sum  quarterly,  we  could  realize  a  cap- 
ital sufficient  to  outpurchase  all  these  undeserving  individuals, 
and  every  man  of  merit  should  have  his  fair  chance  of  promo- 
tion." 

"  Egad,  sir,"  said  Squills,  "there  is  something  grand  in  that 
—eh,  Captain  ?" 

"  No,  sir,"  replied  the  Captain,  quite  seriously ;  "  there  is  in 
monarchies  but  one  fountain  of  honour.  It  would  be  an  inter- 
ference  with  a  soldier's  first  duty — his  respect  for  his  sover- 
eign." 

"  On  the  contrary,"  said  Mr*.  Squills,  "  it  would  still  be  to 
the  sovereigns  that  one  would  owe  the  promotion." 

"Honour,"  pursued  the  Captain,  colouring  up,  and  unheed- 
ing this  witty  interruption,  "  is  the  reward  of  a  soldier.  What 
do  I  care  that  a  young  jackanapes  buys  his  colonelcy  over  my 
head?  Sir,  he  does  not  buy  from  me  my  wounds  and  my 
services.  Sir,  ho  docs  not  buy  from  me  the  medal  I  won  at 
Waterloo,  lb;  is  a  rich  man,  and  I  am  a  poor  man;  ho  is 
Called — colonel,  because  ho  paid  money  for  the  mime.  That 
pleases  him;  well  and  good.  It  would  not  please  me:  I  had 
rather  remain  a  captain,  and  feel  my  dignity,  not  in  my  title, 
hut  in  the  services  by  which  it  lias  been  won.  A  beggarly, 
rascally  association  of  stock-brokers,  for  aught  I  know,  buy  me 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  57 

a  company !     I  don't  want  to  be  uncivil,  or  I  would  say  damn 
'cm,  Mr.— sir— Jack!" 

A  sort  of  thrill  ran  through  the  Captain's  audience — even 
Uncle  Jack  seemed  touched,  for  he  stared  very  hard  at  the 
grim  veteran,  and  said  nothing.  The  pause  was  awkward — 
Mr.  Squills  broke  it.  "  I  should  like,"  quoth  he,  "  to  see  your 
Waterloo  medal — you  have  it  not  about  you  ?" 

"  Mr.  Squills,"  answered  the  Captain,  "  it  lies  next  to  my 
heart  while  I  live.  It  shall  be  buried  in  my  coffin,  and  I  shall 
rise  with  it,  at  the  word  of  command,  on  the  day  of  the  Grand 
Review!"  So  saying,  the  Captain  leisurely  unbuttoned  his 
coat,  and,  detaching  from  a  piece  of  striped  ribbon  as  ugly  a 
specimen  of  the  art  of  the  silversmith  (begging  its  pardon)  as 
ever  rewarded  merit  at  the  expense  of  taste,  placed  the  medal 
on  the  table. 

The  medal  passed  round,  without  a  word,  from  hand  to  hand. 

"It  is  strange,"  at  last  said  my  father,  "how  such  trifles  can 
be  made  of  such  value — how  in  one  age  a  man  sells  his  life  for 
what  in  the  next  age  he  would  not  give  a  button !  A  Greek 
esteemed  beyond  price  a  few  leaves  of  olive  twisted  into  a  cir- 
cular shape,  and  set  upon  his  head — a  very  ridiculous  headgear 
we  should  now  call  it !  An  American  Indian  prefers  a  decora- 
tion of  human  scalps,  which,  I  apprehend,  we  should  all  agree 
(save  and  except  Mr.  Squills,  who  is  accustomed  to  such  things) 
to  be  a  very  disgusting  addition  to  one's  personal  attractions ; 
and  my  brother  values  this  piece  of  silver,  which  may  be  worth 
about  five  shillings,  more  than  Jack  does  a  gold  mine,  or  I  do 
the  library  of  the  London  Museum.  A  time  will  come  when 
people  will  think  that  as  idle  a  decoration  as  leaves  and 
scalps." 

"  Brother,"  said  the  Captain,  "  there  is  nothing  strange  in 
the  matter.  It  is  as  plain  as  a  pike-stafi"  to  a  man  who  under- 
stands the  principles  of  honour." 

"  Possibly,"  said  my  father  mildly.  "  I  should  like  to  hear 
what  you  have  to  say  upon  honour.  I  am  sure  it  would  very 
much  edify  us  all." 

C2 


THE   CAXTONi   : 


CHAPTER  II. 

my  uncle  roland's  discourse  upon  iionour. 

"Gentlemen,"  began  the  Captain,  at  the  distinct  appeal 
thus  made  to  him — "  Gentlemen,  God  made  the  earth,  but  man 
made  the  garden.  God  made  man,  but  man  recreates  him- 
self." 

"  True,  by  knowledge,"  said  my  father. 

"  By  industry,"  said  Uncle  Jack. 

"  By  the  physical  conditions  of  his  body,"  said  Mr.  Squills. 
"  He  could  not  have  made  himself  other  than  he  was  at  first  in 
the  woods  and  wilds  if  he  had  fins  like  a  fish,  or  could  only 
chatter  gibberish  like  a  monkey.  Hands  and  a  tongue,  sir; 
these  are  the  instruments  of  progress." 

"  Mr.  Squills,"  said  my  father,  nodding,  "Anaxagoras  said 
very  much  the  same  thing  before  you,  touching  the  hands." 

"  I  can't  help  that,"  answered  Mr.  Squills ;  "  one  could  not 
open  one's  lips,  if  one  were  bound  to  say  what  nobody  else  had 
Baid.  But,  after  all,  our  superiority  is  less  in  our  hands  than 
the  greatness  of  our  thumbs." 

"  Albums,  de  Sceleto,  and  our  own  learned  William  Lawrence, 
have  made  a  similar  remark,"  again  put  in  my  father." 

"  Hang  it,  sir  !"  exclaimed  Squills,  "  what  business  have  you 
to  know  everything  ?" 

"Everything!  No;  but  thumbs  furnish  subjects  of  inves- 
tigation to  the  simplest  understanding,"  said  my  father,  mod- 
estly. 

"Gentlemen,"  recommenced  my  Uncle  Roland,  "thumbs 
and  hands  are  given  to  an  Esquimaux,  as  well  as  to  scholars 
and  surgeons — and  what  the  deuce  are  they  the  wiser  for 
them?  Sirs,  you  cannot  reduce  us  thus  into  mechanism. 
Look  within.  Man,  I  say,  recreates  himself.  How  ?  By  the 
principle  of  honour.  His  first  desire  is  to  excel  some  one- 
else— his  first  impulse  is  distinction  above  his  fellows.  Heaven 
places  in  his  soul,  as  if  it  were  a  compass,  a  needle  that  always 
points  t"  one  end — viz.  to  honour  in  that  which  those  around 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  59 

him  consider  honourable.  Therefore,  as  man  at  first  is  exposed 
to  all  dangers  from  wild  beasts,  and  from  men  as  savage  as 
himself,  Courage  becomes  the  first  quality  mankind  must  hon- 
our :  therefore  the  savage  is  courageous ;  therefore  he  covets 
the  praise  for  courage ;  therefore  he  decorates  himself  with  the 
skins  of  the  beasts  he  has  subdued,  or  the  scalps  of  the  foes  he 
has  slain.  Sirs,  don't  tell  me  that  the  skins  and  the  scalps  are 
only  hide  and  leather;  they  are  trophies  of  honour.  Don't  tell 
me  that  they  are  ridiculous  and  disgusting  ;  they  become  glo- 
rious as  proofs  that  the  savage  has  emerged  out  of  the  first 
brute-like  egotism,  and  attached  price  to  the  praise  which  men 
never  give  except  for  works  that  secure  or  advance  their  wel- 
fare. By-and-by,  sirs,  our  savages  discover  that  they  cannot 
live  in  safety  amongst  themselves,  unless  they  agree  to  speak 
the  truth  to  each  other  :  therefore  Truth  becomes  valued,  and 
grows  into  a  principle  of  honour  ;  so,  brother  Austin  will  tell 
us  that  in  the  primitive  times,  truth  was  always  the  attribute 
of  a  hero." 

"  Right,"  said  my  father ;  "  Homer  emphatically  assigns  it 
to  Achilles." 

"Out  of  truth  comes  the  necessity  for  some  kind  of  rude  jus- 
tice and  law.  Therefore  men,  after  courage  in  the  warrior,  and 
truth  in  all,  begin  to  attach  honour  to  the  elder,  whom  they  in- 
trust with  preserving  justice  amongst  them.  So,  sirs,  Law  is 
born"— 

"But  the  first  lawgivers  were  priests,"  quoth  my  father. 

"  Sirs,  I  am  coming  to  that.  Whence  arises  the  desire  of 
honour,  but  from  man's  necessity  of  excelling — in  other  words, 
of  improving  his  faculties  for  the  benefit  of  others, — though,  un- 
conscious of  that  consequence,  man  only  strives  for  their  praise  ? 
But  that  desire  for  honour  is  unextinguishable,  and  man  is  nat- 
urally anxious  to  carry  its  rewards  beyond  the  grave.  There- 
fore, he  who  has  slain  most  lions  or  enemies,  is  naturally  prone 
to  believe  that  he  shall  have  the  best  hunting-fields  in  the  coun- 
try beyond,  and  take  the  best  place  at  the  banquet.  Nature, 
in  all  its  operations,  impresses  man  with  the  idea  of  an  invisible 
Power ;  and  the  principle  of  honour — that  is,  the  desire  of 
praise  and  reward — makes  him  anxious  for  the  approval  which 
that  Power  can  bestow.  Thence  comes  the  first  rude  idea  of 
Religiox  ;  and  in  the  death-hymn  at  the  stake,  the  savage 
chants  songs  prophetic  of  the  distinctions  he  is  about  to  re- 


GO  i  in:  <  axto.ns: 

ceive.  Society  goes  on  ;  hamlets  arc  built ;  property  is  estab- 
lished. Be  wh<»  has  more  than  another  has  more  power  than 
another.  Power  is  honoured.  Man  covets  the  honour  attach- 
ed to  the  power  which  is  attached  to  possession.  Thus  the 
Boil  is  cultivated;  thus  the  raits  are  constructed;  thus  tribe 
trades  with  tribe;  thus  Commerce  is  founded,  and  Civiliza- 
tion commenced.  Sirs,  all  that  seems  least  connected  with 
honour,  as  we  approach  the  vulgar  days  of  the  present,  has  its 
origin  in  honour,  and  is  but  an  abuse  of  its  principles.  If  men 
nowadays  are  hucksters  and  traders — if  even  military  honours 
are  purchased,  and  a  rogue  buys  his  way  to  a  peerage — still  all 
arise  from  the  desire  for  honour,  which  society,  as  it  grows  old, 
gives  to  the  outward  signs  of  titles  and  gold,  instead  of,  as 
once,  to  its  inward  essentials, — courage,  truth,  justice,  enter- 
prise. Therefore,  I  say,  sirs,  that  honour  is  the  foundation  of 
all  improvement  in  mankind." 

"  You  have  argued  like  a  schoolman,  brother,"  saidMr.Cax- 
ton,  admiringly;  "but  still,  as  to  this  round  piece  of  silver — 
don't  we  go  back  to  the  most  barbarous  ages  in  estimating  so 
highly  such  things  as  have  no  real  value  in  themselves — as  could 
not  give  us  one  opportunity  for  instructing  our  minds?" 

"  Could  not  pay  for  a  pair  of  boots,"  added  Uncle  Jack. 

"  Or,"  said  Mr.  Squills,  "  save  you  one  twinge  of  the  cursed 
rheumatism  you  have  got  for  life  from  that  night's  bivouac  in 
the  Portuguese  marshes — to  say  nothing  of  the  bullet  in  your 
cranium,  and  that  cork  leg,  which  must  much  diminish  the  sal- 
utary effects  of  your  constitutional  walk." 

"Gentlemen,"  resumed  the  Captain,  nothing  abashed,  "in 
going  back  to  those  barbarous  ages,  I  go  back  to  the  true  prin- 
ciples of  honour.  It  is  precisely  because  this  round  piece  of 
silver  has  no  value  in  the  market  that  it  is  priceless,  for  thus  it 
is  only  a  proof  of  desert.  Where  would  be  the  sense  of  serv- 
ice in  this  medal,  if  it  could  buy  back  my  leg,  or  if  I  could  bar- 
gain it  away  for  forty  thousand  a-year?  No,  sirs,  its  value  is 
this — that  when  I  wear  it  on  my  breast,  men  shall  say,  'that 
formal  old  fellow  is  not  so  useless  as  he  seems.  He  was  one 
of  those  who  -nved  England  and  freed  Europe.'  And  even 
when  I  conceal  it  here"  (and,  devoutly  kissing  the  medal, Uncle 
Roland  restored  it  to  its  ribbon  and  its  resting-place), "  and  no 
eye  sees  it,  its  value  i-  ye1  greater  in  the  thoughl  thai  my 
country  h.-is  not  degraded  the  old  and  true  principles  of  hon- 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  61 

our,  by  paying  the  soldier  who  fought  for  her  in  the  same  coin 
as  that  in  which  you,  Mr.  Jack,  sir,  pay  your  bootmaker's  bill. 
No,  no,  gentlemen.  As  courage  was  the  first  virtue  that  hon- 
our called  forth — the  first  virtue  from  which  all  safety  and  civ- 
ilization proceed,  so  we  do  right  to  keep  that  one  virtue  at 
least  clear  and  unsullied  from  all  the  money-making,  mercena- 
ry, pay-me-in-cash  abominations  which  are  the  vices,  not  the 
virtues,  of  the  civilization  it  has  produced." 

My  Uncle  Roland  here  came  to  a  full  stop ;  and,  filling  his 
glass,  rose  and  said  solemnly — "  A  last  bumper,  gentlemen, — 
'  To  the  dead  who  died  for  England !' " 


CHAPTER  III. 

"  Indeed,  my  dear,  you  must  take  it.  You  certainly  heme 
caught  cold :  you  sneezed  three  times  together." 

"  Yes,  ma'am,  because  I  would  take  a  pinch  of  Uncle  Ro- 
land's snuff,  just  to  say  that  I  had  taken  a  pinch  out  of  his  box 
— the  honour  of  the  thing,  you  know." 

"  Ah,  my  dear !  what  was  that  very  clever  remark  you  made 
at  the  same  time,  which  so  pleased  your  father — something 
about  Jews  and  the  college  ?" 

"Jews  and — oh!  'pulverem  Ohjmpicum  collegisse  juvatf 
my  dear  mother — which  means,  that  it  is  a  pleasure  to  take  a 
pinch  out  of  a  brave  man's  snuff-box.  I  say,  mother,  put  down 
the  posset.  Yes,  I'll  take  it ;  I  will,  indeed.  Now,  then,  sit 
here — that's  right — and  tell  me  all  you  know  about  this  famous 
old  Captain.     Imprimis,  he  is  older  than  my  father  ?" 

"  To  be  sure !"  exclaimed  my  mother,  indignantly ;  "  he  looks 
twenty  years  older ;  but  there  is  only  five  years'  real  difference. 
Your  father  must  always  look  young." 

"  And  why  does  Uncle  Roland  put  that  absurd  French  de  be- 
fore his  name — and  why  were  my  father  and  he  not  good  friends 
— and  is  he  married — and  has  he  any  children  ?" 

Scene  of  this  conference — my  own  little  room,  new  papered 
on  purpose  for  my  return  for  good — trellis-work  paper,  flowers 
and  birds — all  so  fresh,  and  so  new,  and  so  clean,  and  so  gay — 
with  my  books  ranged  in  neat  shelves,  and  a  writing-table  by . 
the  window;  and,  without  the  window,  shines  the  still  sum- 
mer moon.     The  window  is  a  little  open — you  scent  the  flow- 


G2  Tin:  CAXTONS: 

and  the  new-mown  hay.     Past  eleven;  and  the  boy  and  his 

dear  mother  are  all  alone. 

"  My  dear,  my  dear!  you  .*isk  so  many  questions  at  once." 
"Don't  answer  them,  then.  Begin  at  the  beginning,  as 
Nurse  Primminsdoes  with  her  fairy  tales — 'Once  on  a  time.'" 
-Oikv  <m  a  time,  then,"  said  my  mother — kissing  me  be- 
tween the  eyes — a once  on  a  time,  my  love,  there  was  a  certain 
clergyman  in  Cumberland,  who  had  two  sons;  he  had  but  a 
small  living,  and  the  boys  were  to  make  their  own  way  in  the 
world.  But  close  to  the  parsonage,  on  the  brow  of  a  hill,  rose 
an  old  ruin,  with  one  tower  left,  and  this,  with  half  the  coun- 
try round  it,  had  once  belonged  to  the  clergyman's  family ;  but 
all  had  been  sold — all  gone  piece  by  piece,  you  see,  my  dear, 
except  the  presentation  to  the  living  (what  they  call  the  ad- 
vowson  was  sold  too),  which  had  been  secured  to  the  last  of 
the  family.  The  elder  of  these  sons  was  your  Uncle  Roland 
— the  younger  was  your  father.  Now  I  believe  the  first  quar- 
rel aro'se  from  the  absurdest  thing  possible,  as  your  father  says ; 
but  Roland  was  exceedingly  touchy  on  all  things  connected 
with  his  ancestors.  He  was  always  poring  over  the  old  pedi- 
gree, or  wandering  amongst  the  ruins,  or  reading  books  of 
knight-errantry.  Well,  where  this  pedigree  began  I  know  not, 
but  it  seems  that  King  Henry  II.  gave  some  lands  in  Cumber- 
land to  one  Sir  Adam  do  Caxton  ;  and  from  that  time,  you  see, 
the  pedigree  went  regularly  from  father  to  son  till  Henry  V. ; 
then,  apparently  from  the  disorders  produced,  as  your  father 
says,  by  the  Wars  of  the  Roses,  there  was  a  sad  blank  left — 
only  one  or  two  names,  without  dates  or  marriages,  till  the 
time  of  Henry  VII.,  except  that  in  the  reign  of  Edward  IV. 
there  was  one  insertion  of  a  William  Caxton  (named  in  a  deed). 
Now  in  the  village  church  there  was  a  beautiful  brass  monu- 
ment to  one  Sir  William  de  Caxton,  who  had  been  killed  at  the 
battle  of  Bosworth,  lighting  for  that  wicked  king,  Richard  III. 
And  about  the  same  time  there  lived,  as  you  know,  the  greal 
printer,  William  Caxton.  Well,  your  father,  happening  to  be 
in  town  on  a  visit  to  his  aunt,  1<>ok  greal  trouble  in  hunting  up 
all  the  old  papers  he  could  find  :it  the  Herald's  College;  and 
sure  enough  he  was  overjoyed  to  satisfy  himself  thai  he  was 
descended,  nol  from  that  poor  Sir  William,  who  had  been  kill- 
ed in  bo  bad  a  cause,  bul  from  the  greal  printer,  who  was  from 
a  younger  branch  of  the  same  family,  and  to  whose  descend- 


A    FAMILY   PICTURE.  63 

ants  the  estate  came,  in  the  reign  of  Henry  VIII.  It  was 
upon  this  that  your  Uncle  Roland  quarrelled  with  him ;  and, 
indeed,  I  tremble  to  think  that  they  may  touch  on  that  matter 
again." 

"  Then,  my  dear  mother,  I  must  say  my  uncle  was  wrong 
there,  so  far  as  common  sense  is  concerned ;  but  still,  somehow 
or  other,  I  can  understand  it.  Surely  this  was  not  the  only 
cause  of  estrangement  ?" 

My  mother  looked  down  and  moved  one  hand  gently  over 
the  other,  which  was  her  way  when  embarrassed.  "  What  was 
it,  my  own  mother?"  said  I,  coaxingly. 

"  I  believe — that  is,  I — I  think  that  they  were  both  attached 
to  the  same  young  lady." 

"  How !  you  don't  mean  to  say  that  my  father  was  ever  in 
love  with  any  one  but  you  ?" 

"  Yes,  Sisty — yes,  and  deeply !  and,"  added  my  mother,  aft- 
er a  slight  pause,  and  with  a  very  low  sigh,  "  he  never  was  in 
love  with  me ;  and  what  is  more,  he  had  the  frankness  to  tell 
me  so !" 

"  And  yet  you" — 

"Married  him — yes!"  said  my  mother,  raising  the  softest 
and  purest  eyes  that  ever  lover  could  have  wished  to  read  his 
fate  in — "  Yes,  for  the  old  love  was  hopeless.  I  knew  that  I 
could  make  him  happy.  I  knew  that  he  would  love  me  at  last, 
and  he  does  so !     My  son,  your  father  loves  me !" 

As  she  spoke,  there  came  a  blush  as  innocent  as  virgin  ever 
knew,  to  my  mother's  smooth  cheek ;  and  she  looked  so  fair, 
so  good,  and  still  so  young,  all  the  while,  that  you  would  have 
said  that  either  Dusius,  the  Teuton  fiend,  or  Nock,  the  Scandi- 
navian sea-imp,  from  whom  the  learned  assure  us  we  derive 
our  modern  Daimones,  "  The  Deuce,"  and  Old  Nick,  had  in- 
deed possessed  my  father,  if  he  had  not  learned  to  love  such  a 
creature. 

I  pressed  her  hand  to  my  lips,  but  my  heart  was  too  full  to 
speak  for  a  moment  or  so ;  and  then  I  partially  changed  the 
subject. 

"  Well,  and  this  rivalry  estranged  them  more  ?  And  who 
was  the  lady  ?" 

"Your  father  never  told  me,  and  I  never  asked,"  said  my 
mother  simply.  "  But  she  was  very  different  from  me,  I  know. 
Very  accomplished,  very  beautiful,  very  high-born." 


6  J  THE   CAXTONS  : 

"For  all  that,  my  father  was  a  lucky  man  to  escape  her. 
Pass  on.     What  did  the  Captain  do?" 

'•  Why,abouf  that  time  your  grandfather  died,  and  shortly 
after  an  aunt,  on  the  mother's  side,  who  was  rich  and  saving, 
died,  and  unexpectedly  left  them  each  sixteen  thousand  pounds. 
Your  uncle,  with  his  share,  bought  hack,  at  an  enormous  price, 
the  old  castle  and  some  land  round  it,  which  they  say  does  not 
bring  him  in  three  hundred  a  year.  With  the  little  that  re- 
mained, lie  purchased  a  commission  in  the  army;  and  the 
brothers  met  no  more  till  last  week,  when  Roland  suddenly 
arrived." 

"  He  did  not  marry  this  accomplished  young  lady  ?" 

"  Xo !  but  he  married  another,  and  is  a  widower." 

"  Why,  he  was  as  inconstant  as  my  father ;  and  I  am  sure 
without  so  good  an  excuse.     How  was  that  ?" 

"  I  don't  know.     He  says  nothing  about  it." 

"  Has  he  any  children  ?" 

"Two,  a  son — by-the-by,  you  must  never  speak  about  him. 
Your  uncle  briefly  said,  when  I  asked  him  what  was  his  family, 
k  .V  girl,  ma'am.     I  had  a  son,  but — ' 

"  '  He  is  dead,'  cried  your  father,  in  his  kind,  pitying  voice." 

" '  Dead  to  me,  brother — and  you  will  never  mention  his 
name !'  You  should  have  seen  how  stern  your  uncle  looked. 
I  was  terrified." 

"  But  the  girl — why  did  not  he  bring  her  here?" 

"She  is  still  in  France,  but  he  talks  of  going  over  for  her; 
and  we  have  half  promised  to  visit  them  both  in  Cumberland. 
But,  bless  me!  is  that  twelve?  and  the  posset  quite  cold !" 

"  One  word  more,  dearest  mother — one  word.  My  father's 
book — is  he  still  going  on  with  it  ?" 

"Oh,  yes,  indeed!"  cried  my  mother,  clasping  her  hands; 
"  and  he  must  read  it  to  you,  as  he  does  to  me — you  will  un- 
derstand it  so  well.  I  have  always  been  so  anxious  that  the 
world  should  know  him,  and  be  proud  of  him  as  we  are, — so, — 
SO  anxious! — for,  perhaps,  Sisty,  if  he  had  married  that  great 
lady,  he  would  have  routed  himself, been  more  ambitious — and 
I  could  only  make  him  happy,  I  could  not  make  him  great!" 

'•So  he  has  listened  to  you  at  last  V" 

'CT<>  me!"  said  my  mother,  shaking  her  head  and  smiling 
gently.  "  Xo,  rather  to  your  Oncle  Jack,  who,  I  am  happy  to 
say,  ha-  at  Length  <j<>{  a  proper  hold  over  him." 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  65 

"A  proper  hold,  my  dear  mother!  Pray  beware  of  Uncle 
Jack,  or  we  shall  all  be  swept  into  a  coal-mine,  or  explode  with 
a  grand  national  company  for  making  gunpowder  out  of  tea- 
leaves!" 

"  Wicked  child !"  said  my  mother,  laughing ;  and  then,  as 
she  took  up  her  candle  and  lingered  a  moment  while  I  wound 
my  watch,  she  said  musingly, — "  Yet  Jack  is  very,  very  clever, 
— and  if  for  your  sake  we  could  make  a  fortune,  Sisty !" 

"  You  frighten  me  out  of  my  wits,  mother !  You  are  not  in 
earnest  ?" 

"And  if  my  brother  could  be  the  means  of  raising  him  in 
the  world" — 

"  Your  brother  would  be  enough  to  sink  all  the  ships  in  the 
Channel,  ma'am,"  said  I,  quite  irreverently.  I  was  shocked  be- 
fore the  words  were  Avell  out  of  my  mouth ;  and  throwing  my 
arms  round  my  mother's  neck,  I  kissed  away  the  pain  I  had 
inflicted. 

When  I  was  left  alone,  and  in  my  own  little  crib,  in  which 
my  slumber  had  ever  been  so  soft  and  easy, — I  might  as  well 
have  been  lying  upon  cut  straw.  I  tossed  to  and  fro — I  could 
not  sleep.  I  rose,  threw  on  my  dressing-gown,  lighted  my 
candle,  and  sat  down  by  the  table  near  the  window.  First  I 
thought  of  the  unfinished  outline  of  my  father's  youth,  so  sud- 
denly sketched  before  me.  I  filled  up  the  missing  colours,  and 
fancied  the  picture  explained  all  that  had  often  perplexed  my 
conjectures.  I  comprehended,  I  suppose  by  some  secret  sym- 
pathy in  my  own  nature  (for  experience  in  mankind  could  have 
taught  me  little  enough),  how  an  ardent,  serious,  inquiring 
mind  —  struggling  into  passion  under  the  load  of  knowledge, 
had,  with  that  stimulus,  sadly  and  abruptly  withdrawn,  sunk 
into  the  quiet  of  passive,  aimless  study.  I  comprehended  how, 
in  the  indolence  of  a  happy  but  unimpassioned  marriage,  with 
a  companion  so  gentle,  so  provident  and  watchful,  yet  so  little 
formed  to  rouse,  and  task,  and  fire  an  intellect  naturally  calm 
and  meditative — years  upon  years  had  crept  away  in  the  learn- 
ed idleness  of  a  solitary  scholar.  I  comprehended,  too,  how 
gradually  and  slowly,  as  my  father  entered  that  stage  of  mid- 
dle life,  when  all  men  are  most  prone  to  ambition — the  long- 
silenced  whispers  were  heard  again ;  and  the  mind,  at  last  es- 
caping from  the  listless  weight  which  a  baffled  and  disappoint- 
ed heart  had  laid  upon  it,  saw  once  more,  fair  as  in  youth,  the 
only  true  mistress  of  Genius — Fame. 


66  Tin:  CAXTONS  : 

Oli!  how  T  sympathized,  too,  in  my  mother's  gentle  triumph. 
Looking  over  the  past,  I  could  sec,  year  after  year,  how  she  had 
stolen  more  and  more  into  my  father's  heart  of  hearts  —  how 
what  had  been  kindness  had  grown  into  love  —  how  custom 
and  habit,  and  the  countless  links  in  the  sweet  charities  of 
home,  had  supplied  that  sympathy  with  the  genial  man  which 
had  been  missed  at  first  by  the  lonely  scholar. 

Next  1  thought  of  the  gray,  eagle-eyed  old  soldier,  with  his 
ruined  tower  and  barren  acres, — and  saw  before  me  his  proud, 
prejudiced,  chivalrous  boyhood,  gliding  through  the  ruins  or 
poring  over  the  mouldy  pedigree.  And  this  son,  so  disowned 
— for  what  dark  offence? — an  awe  crept  over  me.  And  this 
-ill — his  ewe  lamb — his  all — was  she  fair?  had  she  blue  eyes 
like  my  mother,  or  a  high  Roman  nose  and  beetle  brows  like 
Captain  Roland?  I  mused,  and  mused,  and  mused — and  the 
candle  went  out — and  the  moonlight  grew  broader  and  stiller; 
till  at  last  I  was  sailing  in  a  balloon  with  Uncle  Jack,  and  had 
just  tumbled  into  the  Red  Sea  —  when  the  well-known  voice 
of  Nurse  Primmins  restored  me  to  life  with  a  "  God  bless  my 
heart!  the  boy  has  not  been  in  bed  all  this  'varsal  night!" 


CHAPTER  IV. 

As  soon  as  I  was  dressed  I  hastened  down  stairs,  for  I  long- 
ed  to  revisit  my  old  haunts  —  the  little  plot  of  garden  I  had 
sown  with  anemones  and  cresses  ;  the  walk  by  the  peach  wall ; 
the  pond  wherein  I  had  angled  for  roach  and  perch. 

Entering  the  hall,  I  discovered  my  Uncle  Roland  in  a  great 
state  of  embarrassment.  The  maid-servant  was  scrubbing  the 
stones  at  the  hall-door;  she  was  naturally  plump, — and  it  is 
astonishing  how  much  more  plump  a  female  becomes  when  she 
is  on  all  fours!  —  the  maid-servant,  then,  was  scrubbing  the 
stones,  her  face  turned  from  the  Captain  ;  and  the  Captain,  evi- 
dently meditating  a  sortie,  stood  ruefully  gazing  at  the  obsta- 
cle before  him  and  hemming  aloud.  .Alas,  the  maid-servant 
was  deaf]  I  stopped,  cm-ions  to  see  how  [Jncle  Roland  would 
extricate  himself  from  the  dilemma. 

Finding  that  his  hems  were  in  vain,  my  uncle  made  himself 

mall  as  he  could,  and  glided  close  to  the  left  of  the  wall :  at 

that  instant,  the  maid  in  rued  abruptly  round  towards  the  right, 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  67 

and  completely  obstructed,  by  this  manoeuvre,  the  slight  crev- 
ice through  which  hope  had  dawned  on  her  captive.  My  uncle 
stood  stock-still, — and,  to  say  the  truth,  he  could  not  have  stir- 
red an  inch  without  coming  into  personal  contact  with  the 
rounded  charms  which  blockaded  his  movements.  My  uncle 
took  off  his  hat  and  scratched  his  forehead  in  great  perplexity. 
Presently,  by  a  slight  turn  of  the  flanks,  the  opposing  party, 
while  leaving  him  an  opportunity  of  return,  entirely  precluded 
all  chance  of  egress  in  that  quarter.  My  uncle  retreated  in 
haste,  and  now  presented  himself  to  the  right  wing  of  the  en- 
emy. He  had  scarcely  done  so  when,  without  looking  behind 
her,  the  blockading  party  shoved  aside  the  pail  that  crippled 
the  range  of  her  operations,  and  so  placed  it  that  it  formed  a 
formidable  barricade,  which  my  uncle's  cork  leg  had  no  chance 
of  surmounting.  Therewith  Captain  Roland  lifted  his  eyes  ap- 
pealingly  to  heaven,  and  I  heard  him  distinctly  ejaculate — 

"Would  to  Heaven  she  were  a  creature  in  breeches!" 

But  happily  at  this  moment  the  maid-servant  turned  her  head 
sharply  round,  and,  seeing  the  Captain,  rose  in  an  instant,  moved 
away  the  pail,  and  dropped  a  frightened  curtsy. 

My  Uncle  Roland  touched  his  hat, "  I  beg  you  a  thousand 
pardons,  my  good  girl,"  said  he;  and,  with  a  half  bow,  he  slid 
into  the  open  air. 

"  You  have  a  soldier's  politeness,  uncle,"  said  I,  tucking  my 
arm  into  Captain  Roland's. 

"  Tush,  my  boy,"  said  he,  smiling  seriously,  and  colouring  up 
to  the  temples  ;  "  tush,  say  a  gentleman's !  To  us,  sir,  every 
woman  is  a  lady,  in  right  of  her  sex." 

Now,  I  had  often  occasion  later  to  recall  that  aphorism  of 
my  uncle's;  and  it  served  to  explain  to  me  how  a  man  so 
prejudiced  on  the  score  of  family  pride,  never  seemed  to  con- 
sider it  an  offence  in  my  father  to  have  married  a  woman 
whose  pedigree  was  as  brief  as  my  dear  mother's.  Had  she 
been  a  Montmorenci,  my  uncle  could  not  have  been  more  re- 
spectful and  gallant  than  he  Avas  to  that  meek  descendant  of 
the  Tibbetses.  He  held,  indeed, — which  I  never  knew  any 
other  man,  vain  of  family,  approve  or  support, — a  doctrine  de- 
duced from  the  following  syllogisms:  1st,  That  birth  was  not 
valuable  in  itself,  but  as  a  transmission  of  certain  qualities 
which  descent  from  a  race  of  warriors  should  perpetuate — viz. 
truth,  courage,  honour ;  2dly,  That,  whereas  from  the  woman's 


i  hi:  .  \\ tons  : 

side  we  derive  our  more  intellectual  faculties,  from  the  man's 
we  derive  our  moral ;  a  clever  and  witty  man  generally  lias  a 
clever  and  witty  mother  ;  a  brave  and  honourable  man,  a  brave 
and  honourable  father.  Therefore,  all  the  qualities  which  at- 
tention to  race  should  perpetuate,  are  the  manly  qualities 
traceable  only  from  the  father's  Bide.  Again,  he  held  that 
while  the  aristocracy  have  higher  and  more  chivalrous  notions, 
the  people  generally  have  shrewder  and  livelier  ideas.  There- 
lore,  to  prevent  gentlemen  from  degenerating  into  complete 
dunderheads,  an  admixture  with  the  people,  provided  always 
it  was  on  the  female  side,  was  not  only  excusable,  but  expe- 
dient ;  and,  finally,  my  uncle  held,  that,  whereas  a  man  is  a 
rude,  coarse,  sensual  animal,  and  requires  all  manner  of  asso- 
ciations to  dignify  and  refine  him,  women  are  so  naturally 
susceptible  of  everything  beautiful  in  sentiment,  and  generous 
in  purpose,  that  she  who  is  a  true  woman  is  a  fit  peer  for  a 
king.  Odd  and  preposterous  notions,  no  doubt,  and  capable 
of  much  controversy,  so  far  as  the  doctrine  of  race  (if  that  be 
any  way  tenable)  is  concerned  ;  but  then  the  plain  fact  is,  that 
my  Uncle  Roland  was  as  eccentric  and  contradictory  a  gentle- 
man— as — as — why,  as  you  and  I  are,  if  we  once  venture  to 
think  for  ourselves. 

"  Well,  sir,  and  what  profession  are  you  meant  for  ?"  asked 
my  uncle — "not  the  army, I  fear?" 

"  I  have  never  thought  of  the  subject,  uncle." 

"  Thank  Heaven,"  said  Captain  Roland,  "  we  have  never 
yet  had  a  lawyer  in  the  family!  nor  a  stockbroker,  nor  a 
tradesman — ahem !" 

I  Baw  that  my  great  ancestor  the  printer  suddenly  rose  up 
in  that  hem. 

"Why,  uncle,  there  arc  honourable  men  in  all  callings." 

"Certainly,  sir.  lint  in  all  callings  honour  is  not  the  first 
principle  of  action." 

v-  But  it  may  be,  sir,  if  a  man  of  honour  pursue  it !  There 
are  some  soldiers  who  have  been  great  rascals!" 

My  uncle  Looked  posed, and  his  black  brows  met  thoughtfully. 

"You  an-  right,  boy,  I  dare  say,"  he  answered  somewhat 
mildly.  "  Bui  do  you  think  that  it  ought  to  give  nie  as  much 
pleasure  to  look  on  my  <>ld  ruined  tower,  if  I  knew  it  had  been 
bought  by  some  herring-dealer,  like  the  first  ancestor  of  the 
Poles,  as  I  d')  now,  when  I  know  it   was  given  to  a  knight  and 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  69 

gentleman  (who  traced  his  descent  from  an  Anglo-Dane  in 
the  time  of  King  Alfred),  for  services  done  in  Aquitaine  and 
Gascony,  by  Henry  the  Plantagenet  ?  And  do  you  mean  to 
tell  me  that  I  should  have  been  the  same  man  if  I  had  not  from 
a  boy  associated  that  old  tower  with  all  ideas  of  what  its 
owners  were,  and  should  be,  as  knights  and  gentlemen  1  Sir, 
you  would  have  made  a  different  being  of  me,  if  at  the  head 
of  my  pedigree  you  had  clapped  a  herring-dealer ;  though  I 
dare  say  the  herring-dealer  might  have  been  as  good  a  man 
as  ever  the  Anglo-Dane  was  !     God  rest  him !" 

"And  for  the  same  reason,  I  suppose,  sir,  that  you  think 
my  lather  never  would  have  been  quite  the  same  being  he  is, 
if  he  had  not  made  that  notable  discovery  touching  our  de- 
scent from  the  great  William  Caxton,  the  printer." 

My  uncle  bounded  as  if  he  had  been  shot ;  bounded  so  in- 
cautiously, considering  the  materials  of  which  one  leg  was 
composed,  that  he  would  have  fallen  into  a  strawberry-bed  if 
I  had  not  caught  him  by  the  arm. 

"  Why,  you — you — you  young  jackanapes,"  cried  the  Cap- 
tain, shaking  me  off  as  soon  as  he  regained  his  equilibrium. 
"You  do  not  mean  to  inherit  that  infamous  crotchet  my 
brother  has  got  into  his  head  ?  You  do  not  mean  to  exchange 
Sir  William  de  Caxton,  who  fought  and  fell  at  Bosworth,  for 
the  mechanic  who  sold  black-letter  pamphlets  in  the  Sanctuary 
at  Westminster  ?" 

"  That  depends  on  the  evidence,  uncle !" 

"  No,  sir,  like  all  noble  truths,  it  depends  upon  faith.  Men, 
nowadays,"  continued  my  uncle,  with  a  look  of  ineffable  dis- 
gust, "  actually  require  that  truths  should  be  proved." 

"  It  is  a  sad  conceit  on  their  part,  no  doubt,  my  dear  uncle. 
But  till  a  truth  is  proved,  how  can  we  know  that  it  is  a  truth  ?" 

I  thought  that  in  that  very  sagacious  question  I  had  effect- 
ually caught  my  uncle.  Xot  I.  He  slipped  through  it  like 
an  eel. 

"  Sir,"  said  he,  "  whatever,  in  Truth,  makes  a  man's  heart 
warmer,  and  his  soul  purer,  is  a  belief,  not  a  knowledge. 
Proof,  sir,  is  a  hand-cuff — belief  is  a  wing !  Want  proof  as  to 
an  ancestor  in  the  reign  of  King  Richard !  Sir,  you  cannot 
even  prove  to  the  satisfaction  of  a  logician  that  you  are  the 
son  of  your  own  father.  Sir,  a  religious  man  does  not  want 
to  reason  about  his  religion — religion  is  not  mathematics.    Re- 


To  the  <  axtoxs: 

Ligion  is  to  be  felt,  not  proved.  There  are  a  greal  many  things 
in  the  religion  of  a  good  man  which  arc  not,  in  the  catechism. 
Proof!"  continued  my  uncle,  growing  violent — "Proofj  sir,  is 
a  low,  vulgar,  levelling,  rascally  Jacobin — Belief  is  a  loyal, 
generous,  chivalrous  gentleman  !"  No,  no, — prove  what  you 
please,  you  Bhall  never  rob  me  of  one  belief  that  has  made 
me—" 

".The  finest-hearted  creature  that  ever  talked  nonsense," 
said  my  father,  who  came  up,  like  Horace's  deity,  at  the  right 
moment.  "  What  is  it  you  must  believe  in,  brother,  no  mat- 
ter what  the  proof  against  you?" 

My  uncle  was  silent,  and  with  great  energy  dug  the  point 
of  his  cane  into  the  gravel. 

"  lie  will  not  believe  in  our  great  ancestor  the  printer,"  said 
I,  maliciously. 

My  fathers  calm  brow  was  overcast  in  a  moment. 

"  Brother,"  said  the  captain,  loftily,  "  you  have  a  right  to 
your  own  ideas,  but  you  should  take  care  how  they  contam- 
inate your  child." 

"  Contaminate  !"  said  my  father ;  and  for  the  first  time  I  saw 
an  angry  sparkle  flash  from  his  eyes,  but  he  checked  himself 
on  the  instant :  "  change  the  word,  my  dear  brother." 

"  No,  sir,  I  will  not  change  it !  To  belie  the  records  of  the 
family!" 

"  Records  !  A  brass  plate  in  a  village  church  against  all  the 
books  of  the  College  of  Arms  !" 

"To  renounce  your  ancestor,  a  knight  who  died  in  the 
field !" 

"  For  the  worst  cause  that  man  ever  fought  for!" 

"On  behalf  of  his  king!" 

"  Who  had  murdered  his  nephews!" 

"A  knight !  with  our  cresl  on  his  helmet." 

"And  no  brains  underneath  it,  or  he  would  never  have  had 
them  knocked  out  for  so  bloody  a  villain!" 

"A  rascally,  drudging,  money-making  printer!" 

"The  wise  and  glorious  introducer  of  the  art  that  has  en- 
lightened  a  world.  Prefer  for  an  ancestor,  to  one  whom  schol- 
ar and  sage  never  name  hut  in  homage,  a  worthless,  obscure, 
jolter-heajded  booby  in  mail,  whose  only  record  to  men  is  a 
brass  plate  in  a  church  in  a  village!" 

My    uncle   turned    round    perfectly   livid.     "Enough,  sir! 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  71 

enough !     I  am  insulted  sufficiently.     I  ought  to  have  expect- 
ed it.     I  wish  you  and  your  son  a  very  good  day." 

My  father  stood  aghast.  The  Captain  was  hobbling  off*  to 
the  iron  gate ;  in  another  moment  he  would  have  been  out  of 
our  precincts.  I  ran  up  and  hung  upon  him.  "  Uncle,  it  is  all 
my  fault.  Between  you  and  me  I  am  quite  of  your  side  ;  pray 
forgive  us  both.  What  could  I  have  been  thinking  of,  to  vex 
you  so  ?    And  my  father,  whom  your  visit  has  made  so  happy !" 

My  uncle  paused,  feeling  for  the  latch  of  the  gate.  My  fa- 
ther had  now  come  up,  and  caught  his  hand.  "  What  are  all 
the  printers  that  ever  lived,  and  all  the  books  they  ever  print- 
ed, to  one  wrong  to  thy  fine  heart,  brother  Roland?  Shame 
on  me !  A  bookman's  weak  point,  you  know !  It  is  very  true 
— I  should  never  have  taught  the  boy  one  thing  to  give  you 
pain,  brother  Roland ;  though  I  don't  remember,"  continued 
my  father,  with  a  perplexed  look,  "  that  I  ever  did  teach  it  him 
either !  Pisistralus,  as  you  value  my  blessing,  respect  as  your 
ancestor  Sir  William  de  Caxton,  the  hero  of  Bosworth.  Come, 
come,  brother !" 

"I  am  an  old  fool,"  said  Uncle  Roland,  "whichever  way 
we  look  at  it.  Ah,  you  young  dog !  you  are  laughing  at  us 
both !" 

"  I  have  ordered  breakfast  on  the  lawn,"  said  my  mother, 
coming  out  from  the  porch,  with  her  cheerful  smile  on  her 
lips;  "and  I  think  the  devil  will  be  done  to  your  liking  to- 
day, brother  Roland." 

"  We  have  had  enough  of  the  devil  already,  my  love,"  said 
my  father,  wiping  his  forehead. 

So,  while  the  birds  sang  overhead,  or  hopped  familiarly 
across  the  sward  for  the  crumbs  thrown  forth  to  them,  while 
the  sun  was  still  cool  in  the  east,  and  the  leaves  yet  rustled 
with  the  sweet  air  of  morning,  we  all  sat  down  to  our  table, 
with  hearts  as  reconciled  to  each  other,  and  as  peaceably  dis- 
posed to  thank  God  for  the  fair  world  around  us,  as  if  the  riv- 
er had  never  run  red  through  the  field  of  Bosworth,  and  the 
excellent  Mr.  Caxton  had  never  set  all  mankind  by  the  ears 
with  an  irritating  invention,  a  thousand  times  more  provoca- 
tive of  our  combative  tendencies  than  the  blast  of  the  trumpet 
and  the  gleam  of  the  banner ! 


I  ill.    I  A.XTONS: 


CHAPTER  V. 

M  Brother,"  said  Mr.  Caxton,  "I  will  walk  with  you  to  the 
Roman  encampment." 

The  Captain  felt  that  this  proposal  was  meant  as  the  great- 
est peace-offering  my  father  could  think  of;  for,  1st,  it  was  a 
very  long  walk,  and  my  father  detested  long  walks;  2dly,  it 
was  the  sacrifice  of  a  whole  day's  labour  at  the  Great  Work. 
And  yet,  with  that  quick  sensibility,  which  only  the  generous 
possess,  Uncle  Roland  accepted  at  once  the  proposal.  If  he 
had  not  done  so,  my  father  would  have  had  a  heavier  heart  for 
a  month  to  come.  And  how  could  the  Great  "Work  have  got 
on  while  the  author  was  every  now  and  then  disturbed  by  a 
twinge  of  remorse? 

Half  an  hour  after  breakfast,  the  brothers  set  off  arm-in-arm; 
and  I  followed,  a  little  apart,  admiring  how  sturdily  the  old 
soldier  got  over  the  ground,  in  spite  of  the  cork  leg.  It  was 
pleasant  enough  to  listen  to  their  conversation,  and  notice  the 
contrasts  between  these  two  eccentric  stamps  from  Dame  Na- 
ture's ever-variable  mould, — Nature  who  casts  nothing  in  ste- 
reotype, for  I  do  believe  that  not  even  two  fleas  can  be  found 
identically  the  same. 

My  lather  was  not  a  quick  or  minute  observer  of  rural  beau- 
ties. He  had  so  little  of  the  organ  of  locality,  that  I  suspect 
lie  could  have  lost  his  way  in  his  own  garden.  But  the  Cap- 
tain was  exquisitely  alive  to  external  impressions — not  a  feature 
in  the  landscape  escaped  him.  At  every  fantastic  gnarled  pol- 
lard he  halted  to  gaze  ;  his  eye  followed  the  lark  soaringupfrom 
his  feet ;  when  a  fresher  air  came  from  the  hill-top,  his  nostrils 
dilated,  as  if  voluptuously  to  inhale  its  delight.  My  father, 
with  all  his  learning,  and  though  his  study  had  been  in  the 
stores  of  all  language,  Mas  very  rarely  eloquent.  The  Captain 
had   a  glow  and  a  passion   in  his  words  which,  what  with  his 

deep, tremulous  voice,  and  animated  gestures,  gave  something 
poetic  to  half  of  what  he  uttered.  In  every  sentence  of  Ro- 
land's, in  every  tone  of  his  voice,  and  every  play  of  his  face, 
th<  r<    wrae  some  outbreak  of  pride;  but,  unless  you  set  him- on 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  73 

his  hobby  of  that  great  ancestor  the  printer,  my  father  had  not 
as  much  pride  as  a  homceopathist  could  have  put  into  a  glob- 
ule. He  was  not  proud  even  of  not  being  proud.  Chafe  all 
his  feathers,  and  still  you  could  rouse  but  a  dove.  My  father 
was  slow  and  mild,  my  uncle  quick  and  fiery ;  my  father  rea- 
soned,my  uncle  imagined ;  my  lather  was  very  seldom  wrong, 
my  uncle  never  quite  in  the  right ;  but,  as  my  father  once  said 
of  him,  "  Roland  beats  about  the  bush  till  he  sends  out  the  very 
bird  that  we  went  to  search  for.  He  is  never  in  the  wrong 
without  suggesting  to  us  what  is  the  right."  All  in  my  uncle 
was  stern,  rough,  and  angular;  all  in  my  father  was  sweet, 
polished,  and  rounded  into  a  natural  grace.  My  uncle's  char- 
acter cast  out  a  multiplicity  of  shadows,  like  a  Gothic  pile  in  a 
northern  sky.  My  father  stood  serene  in  the  light,  like  a  Greek 
temple  at  mid-day  in  a  southern  clime.  Their  persons  corre- 
sponded with  their  natures.  My  uncle's  high  aquiline  features, 
bronzed  hue,  rapid  fire  of  eye,  and  upper  lip  that  always  quiv- 
ered, were  a  notable  contrast  to  my  father's  delicate  profile, 
quiet,  abstracted  gaze,  and  the  steady  sweetness  that  rested  on 
his  musing  smile.  Roland's  forehead  was  singularly  high,  and 
rose  to  a  peak  in  the  summit  where  phrenologists  place  the 
organ  of  veneration,  but  it  was  narrow  and  deeply  furrowed. 
Augustine's  might  be  as  high,  but  then  soft,  silky  hair  waved 
carelessly  over  it — concealing  its  height,  but  not  its  vast  breadth 
— on  which  not  a  wrinkle  was  visible.  And  yet,  withal,  there 
was  a  great  family  likeness  between  the  two  brothers.  When 
some  softer  sentiment  subdued  him,  Roland  caught  the  very 
look  of  Augustine ;  when  some  high  emotion  animated  my  fa- 
ther, you  might  have  taken  him  for  Roland.  I  have  often 
thought  since,  in  the  greater  experience  of  mankind  which  life 
has  afforded  me,  that  if,  in  early  years,  their  destinies  had  been 
exchanged — if  Roland  had  taken  to  literature,  and  my  father 
had  been  forced  into  action — that  each  would  have  had  great- 
er worldly  success.  For  Roland's  passion  and  energy  would 
have  given  immediate  and  forcible  effect  to  study;  he  might 
have  been  a  historian  or  a  poet.  It  is  not  study  alone  that 
produces  a  writer ;  it  is  intensity.  In  the  mind,  as  in  yonder 
chimney,  to  make  the  fire  burn  hot  and  quick,  you  must  nar- 
row the  draught.  Whereas,  had  my  father  been  forced  into 
the  practical  world,  his  calm  depth  of  comprehension,  his  clear- 
ness of  reason,  his  general  accuracy  in  such  notions  as  he  onca 

D 


74  i  in.   «  a\i<>\>  : 

entertained  and  pondered  over,joined  to  a  temper  that  crosses 
and  Losses  could  never  ruffle,  and  utter  freedom  from  vanity 
and  m  lf-l.>\  e,  from  prejudice  and  passion,  might  have  made  him 
a  very  wise  and  enlightened  counsellor  in  the  great  affairs  of 
lift — a  lawyer,  a  diplomatist,  a  statesman,  for  what  I  know, 
even  a  -real  general — if  his  tender  humanity  had  not  stood  in 
the  way  of  his  military  mathematics. 

But,  as  it  was — with  his  slow  pulse  never  stimulated  by  ac- 
tion, and  too  little  stirred  by  even  scholarly  ambition — my 
lather's  mind  went  on  widening  and  widening,  till  the  circle 
was  lost  in  the  great  ocean  of  contemplation;  and  Roland's 
pa-^ionate  energy,  fretted  into  fever  by  every  let  and  hin- 
drance, in  the  struggle  with  his  kind — and  narrowed  more  and 
more  as  it  was  curbed  within  the  channels  of  active  discipline 
and  duty — missed  its  due  career  altogether;  and  what  might 
have  been  the  poet,  contracted  into  the  humorist. 

Yet,  who  that  had  ever  known  ye,  could  have  wished  you 
other  than  ye  were — ye  guileless,  affectionate,  honest,  simple 
creatures !  simple  both,  in  spite  of  all  the  learning  of  the  one, 
all  the  prejudices,  whims,  irritabilities,  and  crotchets  of  the 
other  ?  There  you  are — seated  on  the  height  of  the  old  Ro- 
man camp,  with  a  volume  of  the  Stratagems  of  Polyaenus  (or 
is  it  Frontinus '?)  open  on  my  father's  lap ;  the  sheep  grazing 
in  the  furrows  of  the  circumvallations ;  the  curious  steer  gaz- 
ing at  you  where  it  halts  in  the  space  whence  the  Roman  co- 
horts glittered  forth.  And  your  boy-biographer  standing  be- 
hind you  with  folded  arms  ;  and, — as  the  scholar  read  or  point- 
ed his  cane  to  each  fancied  post  in  the  war, — filling  up  the  pas- 
toral landscape  with  the  eagles  of  Agricola  and  the  scythed 
cars  of  Boadicea! 


CHAPTER  VI. 

"It  is  never  the  same  two  hours  together  in  this  country,"' 
said  my  Uncle  Roland,  as,  after  dinner,  or  rather  alter  dessert, 
we  joined  my  mother  in  the  drawing-room. 

Indeed,  a  e<»ld  drizzling  rain  had  come  en  within  the  last 

two  hours;   and,  though  it   was  July,  il   was  as  chilly  as  if  it 

had  been  October.     My  mother  whispered  1<»  me.  and  I  went 

out;  in  ten  minute-  more,  the  logs  (for  we  live  in  a  wood  conn- 


A    FAMILY    PICTUEE.  T5 

try)  blazed  merrily  in  the  grate.  Why  could  not  my  mother 
have  rung  the  bell,  and  ordered  the  servant  to  light  a  fire  ? 
My  dear  reader,  Captain  Roland  was  poor,  and  he  made  a 
capital  virtue  of  economy ! 

The  two  brothers  drew  their  chairs  near  to  the  hearth,  my 
father  at  the  left,  my  uncle  at  the  right ;  and  I  and  my  mother 
sat  down  to  "  Fox  and  geese." 

Coffee  came  in — one  cup  for  the  Captain,  for  the  rest  of  the 
party  avoided  that  exciting  beverage.  And  on  that  cup  was 
a  picture  of— His  Grace  the  Duke  of  Wellington  ! 

During  our  visit  to  the  Roman  camp,  my  mother  had  bor- 
rowed Mr.  Squills'  chaise,  and  driven  over  to  our  market-town, 
for  the  express  purpose  of  greeting  the  Captain's  eyes  with 
the  face  of  his  old  chief. 

My  uncle  changed  colour,  rose,  lifted  my  mother's  hand  to 
his  lips,  and  sat  himself  down  again  in  silence. 

"  I  have  heard,"  said  the  Captain  after  a  pause,  "  that  the 
Marquess  of  Hastings,  who  is  every  inch  a  soldier  and  a  gen- 
tleman— and  that  is  saying  not  a  little,  for  he  measures  seven- 
ty-five inches  from  the  crown  to  the  sole — when  he  received 
Louis  XVIII.  (then  an  exile)  at  Donnington,  fitted  up  his 
apartments  exactly  like  those  his  majesty  had  occupied  at  the 
Tuileries.  It  was  a  kingly  attention  (my  lord  Hastings,  you 
know,  is  sprung  from  the  Plantagenets),  a  kingly  attention  to 
a  king.  It  cost  some  money  and  made  some  noise.  A  woman 
can  show  the  same  royal  delicacy  of  heart  in  this  bit  of  porce- 
lain, and  so  quietly,  that  we  men  all  think  it  a  matter  of  course, 
brother  Austin." 

"You  are  such  a  worshipper  of  women,  Roland,  that  it  is 
melancholy  to  see  you  single.     You  must  marry  again  !" 

My  uncle  first  smiled,  then  frowned,  and  lastly  sighed  some- 
what heavily. 

"  Your  time  will  pass  slowly  in  your  old  tower,  poor  broth- 
er," continued  my  father,  "  with  only  your  little  girl  for  a  com- 
panion." 

"  And  the  past !"  said  my  uncle ;  "  the  past,  that  mighty 
world" — 

"  Do  you  still  read  your  old  books  of  chivalry,  Froissart  and 
the  Chronicles,  Palmerin  of  England  and  Amadis  of  Gaul  ?" 

"  Why,"  said  my  uncle,  reddening,  "  I  have  tried  to  improve 
myself  with  studies  a  little  more  substantial.     And"  (he  added 


7(3  THE  (   w  ions  : 

with  a  Bly  smile)  "there  will  be  your  great  book  for  many  a 
Ioiilc  winter  t«>  come." 
"  Urn!"  said  my  father,  bashfully. 

"Do  you  know,"  quoth  my  uncle,  "that  Dame  Primmins  \a 
a  wry  intelligent  woman ;  full  of  fancy,  and  a  capital  story- 
teller?" 

fc*  I<  not  she,  uncle?"  cried  I,  leaving  my  fox  in  the  corner. 
"  Oh,  if  you  could  hear  her  tell  the  tale  of  King  Arthur  and 
the  Enchanted  Lake,  or  the  Grim  White  Woman!" 

"  I  have  already  heard  her  tell  both,"  said  my  uncle. 

"  The  deuce  you  have,  brother !  My  dear,  we  must  look  to 
this.  These  captains  are  dangerous  gentlemen  in  an  orderly 
household.  Pray,  where  could  you  have  had  the  opportunity 
of  such  private  communications  with  Mrs.  Primmins  ?" 

"Once,"  said  my  uncle,  readily,  "when  I  went  into  her 
room,  while  she  mended  my  stock;  and  once" — he  stopped 
short,  and  looked  down. 

"  Once  when  ? — out  with  it." 

"When  she  was  warming  my  bed,"  said  my  uncle,  in  a 
half-whisper. 

"  Dear !"  said  my  mother  innocently,  "  that's  how  the  sheets 
came  by  that  bad  hole  in  the  middle.  I  thought  it  was  the 
warming-pan." 

"  I  am  quite  shocked !"  faltered  my  uncle. 

"  You  well  may  be,"  said  my  father.  "  A  woman  who  has 
been  heretofore  above  all  suspicion !  But,  come,"  he  said, 
seeing  that  my  uncle  looked  sad,  and  was  no  doubt  casting  up 
the  probable  price  of  twice  six  yards  of  Holland — "  but  come, 
you  were  always  a  famous  rhapsodist  or  tale-teller  yourself. 
Come,  Roland,  let  us  have  some  story  of  your  own  ;  something 
which  your  experience  has  left  strong  in  your  impressions." 

"  Let  us  first  have  the  candles,"  said  my  mother. 

The  candles  were  brought,  the  curtains  let  down — we  all 
drew  our  chairs  to  the  hearth.  But,  in  the  interval,  my  uncle 
had  sunk  into  a  gloomy  reverie;  and,  when  we  called  upon 
him  to  begin,  he  seemed  to  shake  off  with  an  effort  some  rec- 
ollections of  pain. 

"You  ask  me,"  he  said,  "to  tell  you  some  tale  which  my 
<>\v\\  experience  has  h-t't  deeply  marked  in  my  impressions — I 
will  lell  you  one  apart  from  my  own  life,  but  which  has  often 
haunted  me.     It  is  sad  and  Btrange,  ma'am." 


'     A   FAMILY    PICTUKE.  7f 

"  Ma'am,  brother  ?"  said  my  mother,  reproachfully,  letting 
her  small  hand  drop  upon  that  which,  large  and  sunburnt,  the 
Captain  waved  toward  her  as  he  spoke. 

"Austin,  you  have  married  an  angel!"  said  my  uncle;  and 
he  was,  I  believe,  the  only  brother-in-law  who  ever  made  so 
hazardous  an  assertion. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

my  uxcle  koland's  tale. 

"  It  was  in  Spain,  no  matter  where  or  how,  that  it  was  my 
fortune  to  take  prisoner  a  French  officer  of  the  same  rank  that 
I  then  held — a  lieutenant ;  and  there  was  so  much  similarity 
in  our  sentiments,  that  we  became  intimate  friends — the  most 
intimate  friend  I  ever  had,  sister,  out  of  this  dear  circle.  He 
was  a  rough  soldier,  whom  the  world  had  not  well  treated ; 
but  he  never  railed  at  the  world,  and  maintained  that  he  had 
had  his  deserts.  Honour  was  his  idol,  and  the  sense  of  hon- 
our paid  him  for  the  loss  of  all  else. 

"  We  were  both  at  that  time  volunteers  in  a  foreign  service 
— in  that  worst  of  service,  civil  war — he  on  one  side,  I  on  the 
other, — both,  perhaps,  disappointed  in  the  cause  we  had  sev- 
erally espoused.  There  was  something  similar,  too,  in  our  do- 
mestic relationships.  He  had  a  son — a  boy — who  was  all  in 
life  to  him,  next  to  his  country  and  his  duty.  I,  too,  had  then 
such  a  son,  though  of  fewer  years."  (The  Captain  paused  an 
instant :  we  exchanged  glances,  and  a  stifling  sensation  of  pain 
and  suspense  was  felt  by  all  his  listeners.)  "  We  were  accus- 
tomed, brother,  to  talk  of  these  children — to  picture  their  fu- 
ture, to  compare  our  hopes  and  dreams.  We  hoped  and 
dreamed  alike.  A  short  time  sufficed  to  establish  this  confi- 
dence. My  prisoner  was  sent  to  headquarters,  and  soon  after- 
wards exchanged. 

"  We  met  no  more  till  last  year.  Being  then  at  Paris,  I  in- 
quired for  my  old  friend,  and  learned  that  he  was  living  at 

R ,  a  few  miles  from  the  capital.     I  went  to  visit  him.     I 

found  his  house  empty  and  deserted.  That  very  day  he  had 
been  led  to  prison,  charged  with  a  terrible  crime.  I  saw 
him  in  that  prison,  and  from  his  own  lips  learned  his  story. 
His  son  had  been  brought  up,  as  he  fondly  believed,  in  the 


THE   CAXT0N8: 

liabita  and  principles  of  honourable  men;  and  having  finished 

his  education,  came  to  reside  with  him  at  IJ .    The  young 

man  was  accustomed  to  go  frequently  to  Paris.  A  young 
frenchman  loves  pleasure,  Bister;  and  pleasure  is  found  at 
Paris.  The  father  thought  it  natural,  and  stripped  his  age  of 
some  comforts  to  supply  luxuries  to  the  son's  youth. 

k-  Shortly  alter  the  young  man's  arrival,  my  friend  perceived 
that  he  was  robbed.  Moneys  kept  in  his  bureau  were  ab- 
stracted he  knew  not  how,  nor  could  he  guess  by  whom.  It 
must  be  done  in  the  night.  He  concealed  himself,  and  watch- 
ed. He  saw  a  stealthy  figure  glide  in,  he  saw  a  false  key  ap- 
plied to  the  lock — he  started  forward,  seized  the  felon,  and 
recognized  his  son.  What  should  the  father  have  done  ?  I 
do  not  ask  you,  sister !  I  ask  these  men,  son  and  father,  I  ask 
you  ?" 

"  Expelled  him  the  house,"  cried  I. 

"  Done  his  duty,  and  reformed  the  unhappy  wretch,"  said 
my  father.  "JFemo  repente  turpissimus  semper  fait — No  man 
i^  wholly  bad  all  at  once." 

"  The  father  did  as  you  would  have  advised,  brother.  He 
kept  the  youth  ;  he  remonstrated  with  him  ;  he  did  more — he 
gave  him  the  key  of  the  bureau.  'Take  what  I  have  to  give,' 
said  he:  'I  would  rather  be  a  beggar  than  know  my  son  a 
thief.'" 

"  Right :  and  the  youth  repented,  and  became  a  good  man  ?" 
exclaimed  my  father. 

Captain.  Roland  shook  his  head.  "The  youth  promised 
amendment,  and  seemed  penitent.  He  spoke  of  the  tempta- 
tions of  Paris,  the  gaming-table,  and  what  not.  He  gave  up 
his  daily  visits  to  the  capital.  He  seemed  .to  apply  to  study. 
shortly  after  this,  the  neighbourhood  was  alarmed  by  reports 
of  night  robberies  on  the  road.  Men,  masked  and  armed, 
plundered  travellers,  and  even  broke  into  houses. 

"The  police  were  on  the  alert.  One  night  an  old  brother 
officer  knocked  at  my  friend's  door.  It  was  late:  the  veteran 
(he  was  a  cripple,  by  the  way,  like  myself — strange  coinci- 
dence!)  was  in  bed.  He  came  down  in  haste,  when  his  serv- 
ant woke,  and  told  him  that  his  old  friend,  wounded  and  bleed- 
ing, sought  an  asylum  under  his  roof.  The  wound,  however, 
was  slight.     The  guest  had  been  attacked  and  robbed  on  the 

road.    Tin*  next  morning  the  proper  authority  of  the  town  was 


A    FAMILY   PICTUEE.  79 

sent  for.  The  plundered  man  described  his  loss — some  billets 
of  five  hundred  francs  in  a  pocket-book,  on  which  was  embroid- 
ered his  name  and  coronet  (he  was  a  vicomte).  The  guest 
staid  to  dinner.  Late  in  the  forenoon,  the  son  looked  in.  The 
guest  started  to  see  him:  my  friend  noticed  his  paleness. 
Shortly  after,  on  pretence  of  faintness,  the  guest  retired  to  his 
room,  and  sent  for  his  host.  '  My  friend,'  said  he, '  can  you  do 
me  a  favour  ? — s^o  to  the  magistrate  and  recall  the  evidence  I 
have  given.'  .^ 

"  '  Impossible,'  said  the  host.  '  \Yhat  crotchet  is  this  ?' 
"  The  guest  shuddered.  '  Peste /'  said  he  ;  'I  do  not  wish 
in  my  old  age  to  be  hard  on  others.  Who  knows  how  the 
robber  may  have  been  tempted,  and  who  knows  what  rela- 
tions he  may  have — honest  men,  whom  his  crime  would  de- 
grade for  ever!  Good  heavens!  if  detected,  it  is  the  galleys, 
the  galleys  !' 


ti 


And  what  then  ? — the  robber  knew  what  he  braved.' 


'"But  did  his  father  kuow  it  ?'  cried  the  guest. 

"  A  light  broke  upon  my  unhappy  comrade  in  arms :  he 
caught  his  comrade  by  the  hand — '  You  turned  pale  at  my 
son's  sight — where  did  you  ever  see  him  before?     Speak!' 

" '  Last  night,  on  the  road  to  Paris.  The  mask  slipped  aside. 
Call  back  my  evidence !' 

'"You  are  mistaken,'  said  my  friend,  calmly.  'I  saw  my 
son  in  his  bed,  and  blessed  him,  before  I  went  to  my  own.' 

" '  I  will  believe  you,'  said  the  guest ;  '  and  never  shall  my 
hasty  suspicion  pass  my  lips — but  call  back  the  evidence.' 

"The  guest  returned  to  Paris  before  dusk.  The  father  con- 
versed with  his  son  on  the  subject  of  his  studies;  he  followed 
him  to  his  room,  waited  till  he  was  in  bed,  and  was  then  about 
to  retire,  when  the  youth  said,  '  Father,  you  have  forgotten 
your  blessing.' 

"  The  father  went  back,  laid  his  hands  on  the  boy's  head, 
and  prayed.  He  was  credulous — fathers  are  so!  He  was 
persuaded  that  his  friend  had  been  deceived.  He  retired  to 
rest,  and  fell  asleep.  He  woke  suddenly  in  the  middle  of  the 
night,  and  felt  (I  here  quote  his  words) — 'I  felt,'  said  he,  '  as 
if  a  voice  had  awakened  me — a  voice  that  said  "  Rise  and 
search."  I  rose  at  once,  struck  a  light,  and  went  to  my  son's 
room.  The  door  was  locked.  I  knocked  once,  twice,  thrice, 
— no  answer.     I  dared  not  call  aloud,  lest  I  should  rouse  the 


-i)  Tin:  <  anions  : 

servants.  T  went  down  the  stairs — I  opened  the  back-door — 
I  passed  to  the  Btables.  .My  own  horse  was  there,  not  my 
Bon's.  My  horse  neighed;  it  was  old,  like  myself — my  old 
charger  at  Mount  St.  Jean.  I  stole  back,  I  crept  into  the  shad- 
ow of  the  wall  by  my  son's  door,  and  extinguished  my  light. 
I  felt  as  if  I  were  a  thief  myself.'" 

k*  1  brother,"  interrupted  my  mother  under  her  breath,  "  speak 
in  your  own  words,  not  in  this  wretched  father's.  I  know  not 
why,  but  it  would  shock  me  less." 

The  Captain  nodded. 

"  Before  daybreak,  my  •  friend  heard  the  back-door  open 
gently ;  a  foot  ascended  the  stair — a  key  grated  in  the  door 
of  the  room  close  at  hand — the  father  glided  through  the  dark 
into  that  chamber  behind  his  unseen  son. 

"  He  heard  the  clink  of  the  tinder-box  ;  a  light  was  struck; 
it  spread  over  the  room,  but  he  had  time  to  place  himself  be- 
hind the  window-curtain  which  was  close  at  hand.  The  figure 
before  him  stood  a  moment  or  so  motionless,  and  seemed  to 
listen,  for  it  turned  to  the  right,  to  the  left,  its  visage  covered 
with  the  black  hideous  mask  which  is  worn  in  carnivals. 
Slowly  the  mask  was  removed;  could  that  be  his  son's  face? 
the  son  of  a  brave  man? — it  was  pale  and  ghastly  with  scoun- 
drel fears;  the  base  drops  stood  on  the  brow;  the  eye  was 
haggard  and  bloodshot.  He  looked  as  a  coward  looks  Avhen 
death  stands  before  him. 

"The  youth  walked,  or  rather  skulked,  to  the  secretaire, 
unlocked  it,  opened  a  secret  drawer ;  placed  within  it  the  con- 
tents of  his  pockets  and  his  frightful  mask :  the  father  approach- 
ed softly,  looked  over  his  shoulder,  and  saw  in  the  drawer  the 
pocket-book  embroidered  with  his  friend's  name.  Meanwhile, 
the  son  took  out  his  pistols,  uncocked  them  cautiously,  and 
was  about  also  to  secrete  them  when  his  father  arrested  his 
arm.     '  Robber,  the  use  of  these  is  yet  to  come !' 

"The  son's  knees  knocked  together,  an  exclamation  for 
mercy  burst  from  hie  lips;  but  when,  recovering  the  mere 
shock  of  his  dastard  nerves,  he  perceived  it  was  not  the  gripe 
of  some  hireling  of  the  law,  but  a  father's  hand  that  had  clutch- 
ed his  arm,  the  vile  audacity  which  knows  fear  only  from  a 
bodily  cause,  none  from  the  awe  of  shame,  returned  to  him. 

"'Tush,  sir,'  he  said,  'waste  not  time  in  reproaches,  for  I 
fear  the  gens-cParmes  are  on  my  track.     Tt  is  well  that  vou  are  , 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  81 

here ;  you  can  swear  that  I  have  spent  the  night  at  home. 
Unhand  me,  old  man — I  have  these  witnesses  still  to  secrete,' 
and  he  pointed  to  the  garments  wet  and  bedabbled  with  the 
mud  of  the  roads.  He  had  scarcely  spoken  when  the  walls 
shook ;  there  was  the  heavy  clatter  of  hoofs  on  the  ringing 
pavement  without. 

"  4  They  come !'  cried  the  son.  '  Off,  dotard  !  save  your  son 
from  the  galleys.' 

" '  The  galleys,  the  galleys  !'  said  the  father,  staggering  back ; 
4  it  is  true' — he  said — '  the  galleys.' 

"  There  was  a  loud  knocking  at  the  gate.  The  gens-cVarmes 
surrounded  the  house.  '  Open,  in  the  name  of  the  law.'  No 
answer  came,  no  door  was  opened.  Some  of  the  gens-cVarmes 
rode  to  the  rear  of  the  house,  in  which  was  placed  the  stable- 
yard.  From  the  window  of  the  son's  room,  the  father  saw 
the  sudden  blaze  of  torches,  the  shadowy  forms  of  the  men- 
hunters.  He  heard  the  clatter  of  arms  as  they  swung  them- 
selves from  their  horses.  He  heard  a  voice  cry, '  Yes,  this  is 
the  robber's  gray  horse — see,  it  still  reeks  with  sweat !'  And 
behind  and  in  front,  at  either  door,  again  came  the  knocking, 
and  again  the  shout, '  Open,  in  the  name  of  the  law.' 

"  Then  lights  began  to  gleam  from  the  casements  of  the 
neighboring  houses ;  then  the  space  filled  rapidly  with  curious 
wonderers  startled  from  their  sleep ;  the  world  was  astir,  and 
the  crowd  came  round  to  know  Avhat  crime  or  what  shame  had 
entered  the  old  soldier's  home. 

"  Suddenly,  within,  there  was  heard  the  report  of  a  fire-arm ; 
and  a  minute  or  so  afterwards  the  front  door  was  opened,  and 
the  soldier  appeared. 

"  '  Enter,'  he  said  to  the  gens-cVarmes :  '  what  would  you  ?' 

"  '  We  seek  a  robber  who  is  within  your  walls.' 

"  '  I  know  it ;  mount  and  find  him :  I  will  lead  the  way.' 

"  He  ascended  the  stairs,  he  threw  open  his  son's  room ;  the 
officers  of  justice  poured  in,  and  on  the  floor  lay  the  robber's 
corpse. 

"  They  looked  at  each  other  in  amazement.  i  Take  what  is 
left  yon,'  said  the  father.  '  Take  the  dead  man  rescued  from 
the  galleys;  take  the  living  man  on  whose  hands  rests  the 
dead  man's  blood !' 

"  I  was  present  at  my  friend's  trial.  The  facts  had  become 
known  beforehand.     He  stood  there  with  his  sjray  hair,  and 

D  2 


THE    CAXTONS: 

his  mutilated  limits,  and  the  deep  scar  on  his  visage,  and  the 

38  of  the  Legion  of  Honour  on  his  breast ;  and  when  lie  had 

told  his  tale,  he  ended  with  these  words — 'I  have  saved  the 

son  whom  1  reared  for  France  from  a  doom  that  would  have 
spared  the  life  to  brand  it  with  disgrace.  Is  this  a  crime?  I 
give  you  my  life  in  exchange  for  my  son's  disgrace.  Does  my 
country  need  a  victim?  I  have  lived  for  my  country's  glory, 
and  I  can  die  contented  to  satisfy  its  laws;  sure  that,  if  you 
Maine  me,  you  will  not  despise;  sure  that  the  hands  that  give 
me  to  the  headsman  will  scatter  flowers  over  my  grave.  Thus 
1  confess  all.  I,  a  soldier,  look  round  amongst  a  nation  of  sol- 
diers ;  and  in  the  name  of  the  star  which  glitters  on  my  breast, 
I  dare  the  fathers  of  France  to  condemn  me!' 

"They  acquitted  the  soldier — at  least  they  gave  a  verdict 
answering  to  what  in  our  courts  is  called  'justifiable  homicide.' 
V  shout  rose  in  the  court  which  no  ceremonial  voice  could 
still ;  the  crowd  would  have  borne  him  in  triumph  to  his  house, 
but  his  look  repelled  such  vanities.  To  his  house  he  returned 
indeed,  and  the  day  afterwards  they  found  him  dead,  beside 
the  cradle  in  which  his  first  prayer  had  been  breathed  over  his 
sinless  child.  Xow,  father  and  son,  I  ask  you,  do  you  condemn 
that  man?" 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

31  v  father  took  three  strides  up  and  down  the  room,  and 
then,  halting  on  his  hearth,  and  facing  his  brother,  he  thus 
spoke — "  I  condemn  his  deed,  Roland !  At  best  he  was  but  a 
haughty  egotist.  I  understand  why  Brutus  should  slay  his 
sons.  By  that  sacrifice  he  saved  his  country  !  What  did  this 
poor  dupe  of  an  exaggeration  save? — nothing  but  his  own 
oame.  He  could  not  lift  the  crime  from  his  son's  soul,  nor  the 
dishonour  from  his  son's  memory.  He  could  but  gratify  his 
own  vain  pride;  and,  insensibly  to  himself,  his  act  was  whis- 
pered to  him  by  the  fiend  thai  ever  whispers  to  the  heart  of 
man, l  Dread  men's  opinions  more  than  God's  law!'  Oh,  my 
dear  brother,  whal  minds  like  yours  should  guard  against  the 
mosl  is  nol  the  meanness  of  evil — it  is  the  evil  that  takes  false 
nobility,  by  garbing  itself  in  the  royal  magnificence  of  good." 
My  ancle  walked  to  the  window,  opened  it,  looked  out  a  mo- 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  83 

ment,  as  if  to  draw  in  fresh  air,  closed  it  gently,  and  came  back 
again  to  his  seat ;  but  during  the  short  time  the  window  had 
been  left  open,  a  moth  flew  in. 

"  Tales  like  these,"  renewed  my  father,  pityingly — "  whether 
told  by  some  great  tragedian,  or  in  thy  simple  style,  my  broth- 
er,— tales  like  these  have  their  uses :  they  penetrate  the  heart 
to  make  it  wiser ;  but  all  wisdom  is  meek,  my  Roland.  They 
invite  us  to  put  the  question  to  ourselves  that  thou  hast  asked 
— '  Can  we  condemn  this  man  V  and  reason  answers,  as  I  have 
answered — 'We  pity  the  man,  we  condemn  the  deed.'     We 

take  care,  my  love !  that  moth  will  be  in  the  candle.    We 

whish! — whish! — "  and  my  father  stopped  to  drive  away 

the  moth.  My  uncle  turned,  and  taking  his  handkerchief  from 
the  lower  part  of  his  face,  of  which  he  had  wished  to  conceal 
the  workings,  he  napped  away  the  moth  from  the  flame.  My 
mother  moved  the  candles  from  the  moth.  I  tried  to  catch 
the  moth  in  my  father's  straw  hat.  The  deuce  was  in  the 
moth !  it  baffled  us  all,  now  circling  against  the  ceiling,  now 
sweeping  down  at  the  fatal  lights.  As  if  by  a  simultaneous 
impulse,  my  father  approached  one  candle,  my  uncle  approach- 
ed the  other ;  and  just  as  the  moth  was  wheeling  round  and 
round,  irresolute  which  to  choose  for  its  funeral  pyre,  both  can- 
dles were  put  out.  The  fire  had  burned  down  low  in  the  grate, 
and  in  the  sudden  dimness  my  father's  soft  sweet  voice  came 
forth,  as  if  from  an  invisible  being :  "  We  leave  ourselves  in  the 
dark  to  save  a  moth  from  the  flame,  brother !  shall  we  do  less 
for  our  fellow-men  ?  Extinguish,  oh !  humanely  extinguish  the 
light  of  our  reason,  when  the  darkness  more  favours  our  mer- 
cy." Before  the  lights  were  relit,  my  uncle  had  left  the  room. 
His  brother  followed  him ;  my  mother  and  I  drew  near  to  each 
other  and  talked  in  whispers. 


PAET  FOURTH. 

CHAPTER  I. 

1  was  always  an  early  riser.  Happy  the  man  who  is!  Ev- 
ery morning,  day  comes  to  him  with  a  virgin's  love,  full  of 
bloom,  and  purity,  and  freshness.  The  youth  of  Nature  is  con- 
tinuous, like  the  gladness  of  a  happy  child.  I  doubt  if  any 
man  can  be  called  "  old"  so  long  as  he  is  an  early  riser,  and  an 
early  walker.  And  oh,  Youth ! — take  my  word  of  it — youth 
in  dressing-gown  and  slippers,  dawdling  over  breakfast  at  noon, 
is  a  very  decrepit  ghastly  image  of  that  youth  which  sees  the 
Mm  blush  over  the  mountains,  and  thedewrs  sparkle  upon  blos- 
soming hedgerows. 

Passing  by  my  father's  study,  I  was  surprised  to  see  the 
windows  unclosed — surprised  more,  on  looking  in,  to  see  him 
bending  over  his  books — for  I  had  never  before  known  him 
study  till  after  the  morning  meal.  Students  are  not  usually 
early  risers,  for  students,  alas !  whatever  their  age,  are  rarely 
young.  Yes ;  the  Great  Book  must  be  getting  on  in  serious 
earnest.  It  was  no  longer  dalliance  with  learning :  this  was 
work. 

I  passed  through  the  gates  into  the  road.  A  few  of  the  cot- 
tages were  giving  signs  of  returning  life ;  but  it  was  not  yet 
the  hour  for  labour,  and  no  "Good  morning,  sir,"  greeted  me 
on  the  road.  Suddenly  at  a  turn,  which  an  overhanging  beech- 
tree  had  before  concealed,  I  came  full  upon  my  Uncle  Roland. 

'•What!  you,  sir?  So  early?  Hark,  the  clock  is  striking 
five!" 

"  No1  later!  I  have  walked  well  for  a  lame  man.  It  must 
he  more  than  four  miles  to and  back." 

"  You  have  been  to :  not  on  business  ?     No  soul  would 

be  11])." 

"  Yes,  at  inns,  there  is  always  some  one  up.  Ostlers  never 
Bleep]  I  have  been  to  order  my  humble  chaise  and  pair.  I 
Leave  you  to-day,  nephew." 

••  Ah.  uncle,  we  have  offended  you.  It  was  my  folly,  that 
cursed  print — " 


THE    CAXTONS.  85 

"  Pooh !"  said  my  uncle,  quickly.  "  Offended  me,  boy !  I 
defy  you !"  and  he  pressed  my  hand  roughly. 

"  Yet  this  sudden  determination !  It  was  but  yesterday,  at 
the  Roman  Camp,  that  you  planned  an  excursion  with  my  fa- 
ther to  C Castle." 

"  Never  depend  upon  a  whimsical  man.  I  must  be  in  Lon- 
don to-night." 

"  And  return  to-morrow  ?" 

"  I  know  not  when,"  said  my  uncle,  gloomily ;  and  he  was 
silent  for  some  moments.  At  leDgth,  leaning  less  lightly  on 
my  arm,  he  continued — "  Young  man,  you  have  pleased  me.  I 
love  that  open,  saucy  brow  of  yours,  on  which  Nature  has 
written,  '  Trust  me.'  I  love  those  clear  eyes,  that  look  one 
manfully  in  the  face.  I  must  know  more  of  you — much  of 
you.  You  must  come  and  see  me  some  day  or  other  in  your 
ancestors'  ruined  keep." 

"Come!  that  I  will.  And  you  shall  show  me  the  old 
tower — " 

"  And  the  traces  of  the  outworks !"  cried  my  uncle,  flourish- 
ing his  stick. 

"  And  the  pedigree — " 

"  Ay,  and  your  great-great-grandfather's  armour,  which  he 
wore  at  Marston  Moor — " 

"  Yes,  and  the  brass  plate  in  the  church,  uncle." 

"  The  deuce  is  in  the  boy !  Come  here,  come  here ;  I've 
three  minds  to  break  your  head,  sir !" 

"It  is  a  pity  somebody  had  not  broken  the  rascally  printer's, 
before  he  had  the  impudence  to  disgrace  us  by  having  a  fami- 
ly, uncle." 

Captain  Roland  tried  hard  to  frown,  but  he  could  not. 
"  Pshaw !"  said  he,  stopping  and  taking  snuff.  "  The  world  of 
the  dead  is  wide ;  why  should  the  ghosts  jostle  us  ?" 

"  \Ye  can  never  escape  the  ghosts,  uncle.  They  haunt  us 
always.  We  cannot  think  or  act,  but  the  soul  of  some  man, 
who  has  lived  before,  points  the  way.  The  dead  never  die, 
especially  since — " 

"  Since  what,  boy  ? — you  speak  well." 

"  Since  our  great  ancestor  introduced  printing,"  said  I,  ma- 
jestically. 

My  uncle  whistled,  "MaXbrouJc  se'n  va-t-en  guerre." 

I  had  not  the  heart  to  plague  him  further. 


B6  THE   CAXTON8  : 

"  Peace  !"  Baid  I.  creeping  cautiously  within  the  circle  of  the 
-tick. 

"No I  1  forewarn  yon — " 

"  Peace!  and  describe  to  me  my  little  cousin,  your  pretty 
daughter— for  pretty  I  am  sure  she  is." 

"  I  V.ht.**  Baid  my  uncle,  smiling.  "But  you  must  come  and 
judge  for  yourself." 


CHAPTER  II. 

Uxcle  Kolaxd  was  gone.  Before  he  went,  lie  was  closet- 
ed  for  an  hour  with  my  father,  who  then  accompanied  him  to 
the  gate;  and  we  all  crowded  round  him  as  he  stepped  into 
his  chaise.  When  the  Captain  was  gone,  I  tried  to  sound  my 
father  as  to  the  cause  of  so  sudden  a  departure.  But  my  la- 
ther was  impenetrable  in  all  that  related  to  his  brother's  se- 
crets. Whether  or  not  the  Captain  had  ever  confided  to  him 
the  cause  of  his  displeasure  with  his  son  —  a  mystery  which 
much  haunted  me — my  father  was  mute  on  that  score,  both  to 
my  mother  and  myself.  For  two  or  three  days,  however,  Mr. 
Caxton  was  evidently  unsettled.  He  did  not  even  take  to  his 
Great  Work,  but  walked  much  alone,  or  accompanied  only  by 
the  duck,  and  without  even  a  book  in  his  hand.  But  by  de- 
grees the  scholarly  habits  returned  to  him ;  my  mother  mend- 
ed his  pens,  and  the  work  went  on. 

For  my  part,  left  much  to  myself,  especially  in  the  mornings, 
I  began  to  muse  restlessly  over  the  future.  Ungrateful  that  I 
was,  the  happiness  of  home  ceased  to  content  me.  I  heard 
afar  the  roar  of  the  great  world,  and  roved  impatient  by  the 
shore. 

At  length,  one  evening,  my  father,  with  some  modest  hums 
and  ha's,  mid  an  unaffected  blush  on  his  fair  forehead,  gratified 
a  prayer  frequently  urged  on  him,  and  read  me  some  portions 
<>f  i lie  ( rreat  Work.  I  cannot  express  the  feelings  this  lecture 
created — they  were  something  akin  to  awe.  For  the  design 
of  this  book  was  so  immense  —  and  towards  its  execution  a 
learning  so  vast  and  various  had  administered — thai  it  seemed 
t<>  me  as  if  a  spirit  had  opened  i<>  me  a  new  world,  which  had 
always  been  before  my  feet,  bu1  which  my  <>\vn  human  blind- 
ness  had  hitherto  concealed  from  me.     The  unspeakable  pa- 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  87 

tience  with  which  all  these  materials  have  been  collected,  year 
after  year — the  ease  with  which  now,  by  the  calm  power  of 
genius,  they  seemed  of  themselves  to  fall  into  harmony  and 
system — the  unconscious  humility  with  which  the  scholar  ex- 
posed the  stores  of  a  laborious  life ; — all  combined  to  rebuke 
my  own  restlessness  and  ambition,  while  they  filled  me  with  a 
pride  in  my  father,  which  saved  my  wounded  egotism  from  a 
pang.  Here,  indeed,  was  one  of  those  books  Avhich  embrace 
an  existence ;  like  the  Dictionary  of  Bayle,  or  the  History  of 
Gibbon,  or  the  Fasti  Hetteniei  of  Clinton,  it  was  a  book  to 
which  thousands  of  books  had  contributed,  only  to  make  the 
originality  of  the  single  mmd  more  bold  and  clear.  Into  the 
furnace  all  vessels  of  gold,  of  all  ages,  had  been  cast ;  but  from 
the  mould  came  the  new  coin,  with  its  single  stamp.  And 
happily,  the  subject  of  the  work  did  not  forbid  to  the  writer 
the  indulgence  of  his  naive,  peculiar  irony  of  humour — so  quiet, 
yet  so  profound.  My  father's  book  was  the  "  History  of  Hu- 
man Error."  It  was,  therefore,  the  moral  history  of  mankind, 
told  with  truth  and  earnestness,  yet  with  an  arch,  unmalignant 
smile.  Sometimes,  indeed,  the  smile  drew  tears.  But  in  all 
true  humour  lies  its  germ,  pathos.  Oh !  by  the  goddess  Moria 
or  Folly,  but  he  was  at  home  in  his  theme !  He  viewed  man 
first  in  the  savage  state,  preferring  in  this  the  positive  accounts 
of  voyagers  and  travellers,  to  the  vague  myths  of  antiquity, 
and  the  dreams  of  speculators  on  our  pristine  state.  From 
Australia  and  Abyssinia  he  drew  pictures  of  mortality  un- 
adorned, as  lively  as  if  he  had  lived  amongst  Bushmen  and 
savages  all  his  life.  Then  he  crossed  over  the  Atlantic,  and 
brought  before  you  the  American  Indian,  with  his  noble  na- 
ture, struggling  into  the  dawn  of  civilization,  when  friend  Penn 
cheated  him  out  of  his  birthright,  and  the  Anglo-Saxon  drove 
him  back  into  darkness.  He  showed  both  analogy  and  con- 
trast between  this  specimen  of  our  kind,  and  others  equally 
apart  from  the  extremes  of  the  savage  state  and  the  cultured. 
The  Arab  in  his  tent,  the  Teuton  in  his  forests,  the  Greenland- 
er  in  his  boat,  the  Fin  in  his  reindeer  car.  Up  sprang  the  rude 
gods  of  the  north,  and  the  resuscitated  Druidism,  passing  from 
its  earliest  templeless  belief  into  the  later  corruptions  of  croni- 
mell  and  idol.  Up  sprang,  by  their  side,  the  Saturn  of  the 
Phoenicians,  the  mystic  Budh  of  India,  the  elementary  deities 
of  the  Pelasgian,  the  Xaith  and  Serapis  of  Egypt,  the  Ormuzd 


THE   CAXTONS: 

of  Persia,  the  Bel  of  Babylon,  the  winged  genii  of  the  graceful 
Etruria.  Bow  nature  and  life  shaped  the  religion;  how  the 
religion  Bhaped  the  manners;  how,  and  by  what  influences, 
some  tribes  were  formed  for  progress;  how'others  were  des- 
tined to  remain  stationary,  or  be  swallowed  up  in  war  and 
slavery  by  their  brethren,  was  told  with  a  precision  clear  and 
strong  as  the  voice  of  Fate.  Not  only  an  antiquarian  and 
philologist,  but  an  anatomist  and  philosopher  —  my  father 
brought  to  bear  on  all  these  grave  points  the  various  specula- 
tions involved  in  the  distinction  of  races.  He  showed  how 
race  in  perfection  is  produced,  up  to  a  certain  point,  by  admix- 
ture; how  all  mixed  races  have  been  the  most  intelligent — 
how,  in  proportion  as  local  circumstance  and  religious  faith 
permitted  the  early  fusion  of  different  tribes,  races  improved 
and  quickened  into  the  refinements  of  civilization.  He  tracked 
the  progress  and  dispersion  of  the  Hellenes,  from  their  mythical 
cradle  in  Thessaly ;  and  showed  how  those  wTho  settled  near 
the  sea-shores,  and  were  compelled  into  commerce  and  inter- 
course with  strangers,  gave  to  Greece  her  marvellous  accom- 
plishments in  arts  and  letters — the  flowers  of  the  ancient 
world.  How  others,  like  the  Spartans,  dwelling  evermore  in  a 
camp,  on  guard  against  their  neighbours,  and  rigidly  preserv- 
ing their  Dorian  purity  of  extraction,  contributed  neither  art- 
ists, poets,  nor  philosophers  to  the  golden  treasure-house  of 
mind.  He  took  the  old  race  of  the  Celts,  Cimry,  or  Cimme- 
rians. He  compared  the  Celt  who,  as  in  Wales,  the  Scotch 
Highlands,  in  Bretagne,  and  in  uncomprehended  Ireland,  re- 
tains his  old  characteristics  and  purity  of  breed,  with  the  Celt 
whose  blood,  mixed  by  a  thousand  channels,  dictates  from 
Paris  the  manners  and  revolutions  of  the  world.  He  compared 
Norman  in  his  ancient  Scandinavian  home,  with  that  won- 
der of  intelligence  and  chivalry  into  which  he  grew,  fused  im- 
perceptibly with  the:  Frank,  the  Goth,  and  the  Anglo-Saxon. 
Ho  compared  the  Saxon,  stationary  in  the  land  of  Horsa,  with 
the  colonist  and  civilizer  of  the  -lobe,  as  he  becomes,  when  he 
knows  not  through  what  channels — French,  Flemish,  Danish, 
Welsh,  Scotch,  and  Irish — he  draws  his  sanguine  blood.  And 
out  from  all  these  speculations,  to  which  I  do  such  hurried  and 
scanty  justice,  he  drew  the  blessed  truth,  that  carries  hope  to 
the  land  of  the  Caffre,  the  lmt  of  the  Bushman — that  there  is 
nothing  in  the  flattened  ^kull  and  the  ebon  aspect  that  rejects 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  89 

God's  law — improvement ;  that  by  the  same  principle  which 
raises  the  dog,  the  lowest  of  the  animals  in  its  savage  state,  to 
the  highest  after  man — viz.  admixture  of  race — you  can  elevate 
into  nations  of  majesty  and  power  the  outcasts  of  humanity, 
now  your  compassion  or  your  scorn.  But  when  my  father  got 
into  the  marrow  of  his  theme — when,  quitting  these  prelimin- 
ary discussions,  he  fell  pounce  amongst  the  would-be  wisdom 
of  the  wise ;  when  he  dealt  with  civilization  itself,  its  schools, 
and  porticos,  and  academies ;  when  he  bared  the  absurdities 
couched  beneath  the  colleges  of  the  Egyptians,  and  the  Sym- 
posia of  the  Greeks;  when  he  showed  that,  even  in  their  own 
favourite  pursuit  of  metaphysics,  the  Greeks  were  children ; 
and,  in  their  own  more  practical  region  of  polities,  the  Eomans 
were  visionaries  and  bunglers ; — when,  following  the  stream 
of  error  through  the  Middle  Ages,  he  quoted  the  puerilities  of 
Agrippa,  the  crudities  of  Cardan,  and  passed,  with  his  calm 
smile,  into  the  salons  of  the  chattering  wits  of  Paris  in  the 
eighteenth  century,  oh !  then  his  irony  was  that  of  Lucian, 
sweetened  by  the  gentle  spirit  of  Erasmus.  For  not  even 
here  was  my  father's  satire  of  the  cheerless  and  Mephistophe- 
lian  school.  From  this  record  of  error  he  drew  forth  the  grand 
eras  of  truth.  He  showed  how  earnest  men  never  think  in 
vain,  though  their  thoughts  may  be  errors.  He  proved  how, 
in  vast  cycles,  age  after  age,  the  human  mind  marches  on — 
like  the  ocean,  receding  here,  but  there  advancing :  how  from 
the  speculations  of  the  Greek  sprang  all  true  philosophy ;  how 
from  the  institutions  of  the  Roman  rose  all  durable  systems  of 
government ;  how  from  the  robust  follies  of  the  north  came 
the  glory  of  chivalry,  and  the  modern  delicacies  of  honour,  and 
the  sweet  harmonizing  influences  of  woman.  He  tracked  the 
ancestry  of  our  Sidneys  and  Bayards  from  the  Hengists,  Gen- 
serics,  and  Attilas.  Full  of  all  curious  and  quaint  anecdote — 
of  original  illustration — of  those  niceties  of  learning  which 
spring  from  a  taste  cultivated  to  the  last  exquisite  polish — the 
book  amused,  and  allured,  and  charmed ;  and  erudition  lost  its 
pedantry  now  in  the  simplicity  of  Montaigne,  now  in  the  pene- 
tration of  La  Bruyere.  He  lived  in  each  time  of  which  he 
wrote,  and  the  time  lived  again  in  him.  Ah !  what  a  writer 
of  romances  he  would  have  been,  if— if  what !  If  he  had  had 
as  sad  an  experience  of  men's  passions,  as  he  had  the  happy 
intuition  into  their  humours.     But  he  who  would  see  the  mir- 


90  THE   CAXTON8  : 

ror  of  the  shore,  must  look  where  it  is  cast  on  the  river,  not 
the  ocean.  The  oarrow  stream  reflects  the  gnarled  tree,  and 
the  pausing  herd,  and  the  village  Bpire,  and  the  romance  of 
ilu'  landscape  ;  bul  the  sea  reflects  only  tlie  vast  outline  of  the 
headland,  and  the  lights  of  the  eternal  heaven. 


CHAPTER  III. 

"It  is  Lombard  Street  to  a  china  orange,"  quoth  Uncle 
Jack. 

"Are  the  odds  in  favour  of  fame  against  failure  so  great? 
Sou  do  not  speak,  I  fear,  from  experience,  brother  Jack,"  an- 
swered my  father  as  he  stooped  down  to  tickle  the  duck  under 
the  left  ear. 

"  But  Jack  Tibbetts  is  not  Augustine  Caxton.  Jack  Tib- 
betts  is  not  a  scholar,  a  genius,  a,  wond — " 

"Stop!"  cried  my  father. 

'•After  all,"  said  Mr.  Squills,  "though  I  am  no  flatterer,  Mr, 
Tibbetts  is  not  so  far  out.  That  part  of  your  book  which  com- 
pares the  crania,  or  skulls  of  the  different  races,  is  superb. 
Lawrence  or  Dr.  Prichard  could  not  have  done  the  thing  more 
neatly.  Such  a  book  must  not  be  lost  to  the  world;  and  I 
agree  with  Mr.  Tibbetts  that  you  should  publish  as  soon  as 
possible." 

"  It  is  one  thing  to  write  and  another  to  publish,"  said  my 
father,  irresolutely.  "When  one  considers  all  the  great  men 
who  have  published ;  when  one  thinks  one  is  going  to  intrude 
one's  self  audaciously  into  the  company  of  Aristotle  and  Bacon, 
of  Locke,  of  Herder — of  all  the  grave  philosophers  who  bend 
over  Nature  with  brows  weighty  with  thought — one  may  well 
pause,  and — " 

••  Pooh!"  interrupted  Uncle  Jack;  "science  is  not  a  club, 
ii  is  an  ocean:  it  is  open  to  the  cockboat  as  the  frigate.  One 
man  carries  across  it  a  freightage  of  ingots,  another  may  fish 
there  for  herrings.  Who  can  exhaust  the  sea?  who  say  to  in- 
tellect, 'The  deeps  of  philosophy  are  preoccupied?'" 

k-  Admirable  I*1  cried  Squills.  . 

"So  ii  is  really  you)-  advice,  my  friend,"  said  my  father,  who 
seemed  struck  with  uncle  .lack's  eloquent  illustrations,  " that  I 
should  desert  my  household  gods,  remove  to  London,  since  my 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  91 

own  library  ceases  to  supply  my  wants ;  take  lodgings  near 
the  British  Museum,  and  finish  off  one  volume,  at  least,  incon- 
tinently." 

"It  is  a  duty  you  owe  to  your  country,"  said  uncle  Jack, 
solemnly. 

"  And  to  yourself,"  urged  Squills.  "  One  must  attend  to  the 
natural  evacuations  of  the  brain.  Ah !  you  may  smile,  sir ;  but 
I  have  observed  that  if  a  man  has  much  in  his  head,  he  must 
give  it  vent,  or  it  oppresses  him ;  the  whole  system  goes  wrong. 
From  being  abstracted,  he  grows  stupefied.  The  weight  of 
the  pressure  affects  the  nerves.  I  would  not  even  guarantee 
you  from  a  stroke  of  paralysis." 

"  Oh,  Austin!"  cried  my  mother  tenderly,  and  throwing  her 
arms  round  my  father's  neck. 

"  Come,  sir,  you  are  conquered,"  said  I. 

"And  what  is  to  become  of  you,  Sisty?"  asked  my  father. 
"Do  you  go  with  us,  and  unsettle  your  mind  for  the  univer- 
sity?" 

"  My  uncle  has  invited  me  to  his  castle ;  and  in  the  mean- 
while I  will  stay  here,  fag  hard,  and  take  care  of  the  duck." 

"All  alone?"  said  my  mother. 

"  Xo.  All  alone  !  Why,  Uncle  Jack  will  come  here  as  often 
as  ever,  I  hope." 

Uncle  Jack  shook  his  head. 

"  Xo,  my  boy — I  must  go  to  town  with  your  father.  You 
don't  understand  these  things.  I  shall  see  the  booksellers  for 
him.  I  know  how  these  gentlemen  are  to  be  dealt  with.  I 
shall  prepare  the  literary  circles  for  the  appearance  of  the 
book.  In  short,  it  is  a  sacrifice  of  interest,  I  know.  My  Jour- 
nal will  suffer.  But  friendship  and  my  country's  good  before 
all  things." 

"Dear  Jack!"  said  my  mother  affectionately. 

"  I  cannot  suffer  it,"  cried  my  father.  "  You  are  making  a 
good  income.  You  are  doing  well  where  you  are ;  and  as  to 
seeing  the  booksellers — why,  when  the  work  is  ready,  you  can 
come  to  town  for  a  week,  and  settle  that  affair." 

"  Poor  dear  Austin !"  said  Uncle  Jack,  with  an  air  of  supe- 
riority and  compassion.  "A  week !  Sir,  the  advent  of  a  book 
that  is  to  succeed  requires  the  preparation  of  months.  Pshaw ! 
I  am  no  genius,  but  I  am  a  practical  man.  I  know  what's 
what.     Leave  me  alone." 


THE    CAXTONS: 

Bui  my  father  continued  obstinate,  and  Uncle  Jack  at  last 
jed  to  urge  the  matter.  The  journey  to  lame  and  London 
w  as  uow  settled  ;  bul  my  father  would  not  hear  of  my  staying 
behind. 

No;  Pisistratus  must  needs  go  also  to  town  and  see  the 
world;  the  duck  would  take  care  of  itself. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

We  had  taken  the  precaution  to  send,  the  day  before,  to 
secure  our  due  complement  of  places — four  in  all  (including 
one  for  Mrs.  Primmins) — in,  or  upon,  the  fast  family  coach 
called  the  Sun,  which  had  lately  been  set  up  for  the  special 
convenience  of  the  neighbourhood. 

This  luminary,  rising  in  a  town  about  seven  miles  distant 
from  us,  described  at  first  a  very  erratic  orbit  amidst  the  con- 
tiguous villages,  before  it  finally  struck  into  the  high-road  of 
enlightenment,  and  thence  performed  its  journey,  in  the  full 
-  of  man,  at  the  majestic  pace  of  six  miles  and  a  half  an 
hour.  My  father,  with  his  pockets  full  of  books,  and  a  quarto 
of  "  Gebelin  on  the  Primitive  World,"  for  light  reading,  under 
his  arm;  my  mother,  with  a  little  basket,  containing  sand- 
wiches, and  biscuits  of  her  own  baking;  Mrs.  Primmins,  with 
a  new  umbrella  purchased  for  the  occasion,  and  a  birdcage 
containing  a  canary,  endeared  to  her  not  more  by  song  than 
age,  and  a  severe  pip  through  which  she  had  successfully 
nursed  it — and  I  myself,  waited  at  the  gates  to  welcome  the 
celestial  visitor.  The  gardener,  with  a  wheelbarrow  full  of 
boxes  and  portmanteaus,  stood  a  little  in  the  van;  and  the 
footman,  who  was  to  follow  when  lodgings  had  been  found, 
had  gone  to  a  rising  eminence  to  watch  the  dawning  of  the 
expected  Sun,  and  apprise  us  of  its  approach  by  the  concerted 
signal  of  a  handkerchief  fixed  to  a  stick. 

The  quaint  old  house  looked  :ii  us  mournfully  from  all  its 
deserted  windows.  The  litter  before  its  threshold  and  in  its 
open  hall  ;  wi<ps  of  straw  or  hay  thai  had  been  used  for  pack- 
ing; baskets  and  boxes  that  had  been  examined  and  rejected; 
others,  corded  and  piled,  reserved  to  follow  with  the  footman 
— and  the  two  heated  and  hurried  serving-women  left  behind 
standing  half-way  between  house  and  garden-gate,  whispering 


A    FAMILY   PICTUKE.  93 

to  each  other,  and  looking  as  if  they  had  not  slept  for  weeks 
— gave  to  a  scene,  usually  so  trim  and  orderly,  an  aspect  of 
pathetic  abandonment  and  desolation.  The  Genius  of  the 
place  seemed  to  reproach  us.  I  felt  the  omens  were  against 
us,  and  turned  my  earnest  gaze  from  the  haunts  behind  with 
a  sigh,  as  the  coach  now  drew  up  with  all  its  grandeur.  An 
important  personage,  who,  despite  the  heat  of  the  day,  was 
enveloped  in  a  vast  superfluity  of  belcher,  in  the  midst  of 
which  galloped  a  gilt  fox,  and  who  rejoiced  in  the  name  of 
"guard,"  descended  to  inform  us  politely,  that  only  three 
places,  two  inside  and  one  out,  were  at  our  disposal,  the  rest 
having  been  pre-engaged  a  fortnight  before  our  orders  were 
received. 

Now,  as  I  knew  that  Mrs.  Primmins  was  indispensable  to 
the  comforts  of  my  honored  parents  (the  more  so,  as  she  had 
once  lived  in  London,  and  knew  all  its  ways),  I  suggested  that 
she  should  take  the  outside  seat,  and  that  I  should  perform  the 
journey  on  foot — a  primitive  mode  of  transport,  which  has  its 
charms  to  a  young  man  with  stout  limbs  and  gay  spirits.  The 
guard's  outstretched  arm  left  my  mother  little  time  to  oppose 
this  proposition,  to  which  my  father  assented  with  a  silent 
squeeze  of  the  hand.  And,  having  promised  to  join  them  at 
a  family  hotel  near  the  Strand,  to  which  Mr.  Squills  had  rec- 
ommended them  as  peculiarly  genteel  and  quiet,  and  waved 
my  last  farewell  to  my  poor  mother,  who  continued  to  stretch 
her  meek  face  out  of  the  window  till  the  coach  was  whirled 
off  in  a  cloud  like  one  of  the  Homeric  heroes,  I  turned  within, 
to  put  up  a  few  necessary  articles  in  a  small  knapsack,  which 
I  remembered  to  have  seen  in  the  lumber-room,  and  which  had 
appertained  to  my  maternal  grandfather ;  and  with  that  on  my 
shoulder,  and  a  strong  staff  in  my  hand,  I  set  oft"  towards  the 
great  city  at  as  brisk  a  pace  as  if  I  were  only  bound  to  the 
next  village.  Accordingly,  about  noon  I  was  both  tired  and 
hungry ;  and  seeing  by  the  wayside  one  of  those  pretty  inns 
yet  peculiar  to  England,  but  which,  thanks  to  the  railways, 
will  soon  be  amongst  the  things  before  the  Flood,  I  sat  down 
at  a  table  under  some  clipped  limes,  unbuckled  my  knapsack, 
and  ordered  my  simple  fare  with  the  dignity  of  one  who,  for 
the  first  time  in  his  life,  bespeaks  his  own  dinner,  and  pays  for 
it  out  of  his  own  pocket. 

While  engaged  on  a  rasher  of  bacon  and  a  tankard  of  what 


04  i  m:   CAXTONB ! 

the  landlord  called  "No  mistake,"  two  pedestrians,  passing 
the  Bame  mad  which  I  had  traversed,  paused,  east  a  simulta- 
neous look  at  my  occupation,  and  induced  no  doubt  by  its 
allurements,  seated  themselves  under  the  same  lime-trees, 
though  at  the  farther  end  of  the  table.  I  surveyed  the  new- 
comers  with  the  curiosity  natural  to  my  years. 

The  elder  of  the  two  might  have  attained  the  age  of  thirty, 
though  sundry  deep  lines,  and  hues  formerly  florid  and  now 
faded,  speaking  of  fatigue,  care,  or  dissipation,  might  have 
made  him  look  somewhat  older  than  he  was.  There  was  noth- 
ing very  prepossessing  in  his  appearance.  He  was  dressed 
with  a  pretension  ill  suited  to  the  costume  appropriate  to  a 
foot-traveler.  His  coat  was  pinched  and  padded ;  two  enor- 
mous pins,  connected  by  a  chain,  decorated  a  very  stiff  stock 
of  blue  satin,  dotted  with  yellow  stars  ;  his  hands  were  cased 
in  very  dingy  gloves,  which  had  once  been  straw-coloured^and 
the  said  hands  played  with  a  whalebone  cane  surmounted  by 
a  formidable  knob,  which  gave  it  the  appearance  of  a  "life- 
preserver."  As  he  took  off  a  white  napless  hat,  which  he 
wiped  with  great  care  and  affection  with  the  sleeve  of  his  right 
arm,  a  profusion  of  stiff  curls  instantly  betrayed  the  art  of  man. 
Like  my  landlord's  ale,  in  the  wig  there  was  "  no  mistake :"  it 
Mas  brought  (after  the  fashion  of  the  wigs  we  see  in  the  popu- 
lar effigies  of  George  IV.  in  his  youth)  low  over  his  forehead 
and  was  raised  at  the  top.  The  wig  had  been  oiled,  and  the 
oil  had  imbibed  no  small  quantity  of  dust ;  oil  and  dust  had 
alike  left  their  impression  on  the  forehead  and  cheeks  of  the 
wig's  proprietor.  For  the  rest,  the  expression  of  his  face  was 
somewhat  impudent  and  reckless,  but  not  without  a  certain 
drollery  in  the  corners  of  his  eyes. 

The  younger  man  Avas  apparently  about  my  own  age,  a  year 
or  two  older  perhaps — judging  rather  from  his  set  and  sinewy 
frame  than  his  boyish  countenance.  And  this  last,  boyish  as 
it  was,  could  not  fail  to  command  the  attention  even  of  the 
most  careless  observer.  It  had  not  only  the  darkness,  but  the 
character  of  the  gipsy  face,  with  large  brilliant  eyes,  raven 
hair, long  and  wavy,  but  not  curling;  the  features  were  aqui- 
line, bul  delicate,  and  when  he  spoke  he  showed  teeth  dazzling 
a-  pearls.  It  was  Impossible  not  i<>  admire  the  singular  beau- 
ty of  the  countenance ;  andyet,i1  had  that  expression,  at  once 
si< -alihv  and  fierce,  which  war  with  society  has  stamped  upon 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  95 

the  lineaments  of  the  race  of  which  it  reminded  me.  But, 
withal,  there  was  somewhat  of  the  air  of  a  gentleman  in  this 
young  wayfarer.  His  dress  consisted  of  a  black  velveteen 
shooting-jacket,  or  rather  short  frock,  with  a  broad  leathern 
strap  at  the  waist,  loose  white  trousers,  and  a  foraging  cap, 
which  he  threw  carelessly  on  the  table  as  he  wiped  his  brow. 
Turning  round  impatiently,  and  with  some  haughtiness,  from 
his  companion,  he  surveyed  me  with  a  quick,  observant  flash 
of  his  piercing  eyes,  and  then  stretched  himself  at  length  on 
the  bench,  and  appeared  either  to  dose  or  muse,  till,  in  obe- 
dience to  his  companion's  orders,  the  board  was  spread  with 
all  the  cold  meats  the  larder  could  supply. 

"Beef!"  said  his  companion,  screwing  a  pinchbeck  glass 
into  his  right  eye.  Beef; — mottled,  cowey — humph!  Lamb; 
— oldish — rawish — muttony — humph!  Pie; — stalish.  Veal? 
— no,  pork.     Ah!  what  will  you  have  ?" 

"Help  yourself,"  replied  the  young  man  peevishly,  as  he  sat 
up,  looked  disdainfully  at  the  viands,  and,  after  a  long  pause, 
tasted  first  one,  then  the  other,  with  many  shrugs  of  the  shoul- 
ders and  muttered  exclamations  of  discontent.  Suddenly  he 
looked  up,  and  called  for  brandy ;  and,  to  my  surprise,  and  I 
fear  admiration,  he  drank  nearly  half  a  tumblerful  of  that  poi- 
son undiluted,  with  a  composure  that  spoke  of  habitual  use. 

"  Wrong !"  said  his  companion,  drawing  the  bottle  to  him- 
self, and  mixing  the  alcohol  in  careful  proportions  with  water. 
Wrong !  coats  of  stomach  soon  wear  out  with  that  kind  of 
clothes-brush.  Better  stick  to  the  4  yeasty  foam,'  as  sweet  Will 
says.  That  young  gentleman  sets  you  a  good  example,"  and 
therewith  the  speaker  nodded  at  me  familiarly.  Inexperienced 
as  I  was,  I  surmised  at  once  that  it  was  his  intention  to  make 
acquaintance  with  the  neighbour  thus  saluted.  I  was  not  de- 
ceived. "  Anything  to  tempt  you,  sir  ?"  asked  this  social  per- 
sonage after  a  short  pause,  and  describing  a  semicircle  with  the 
point  of  his  knife. 

"  I  thank  you,  sir,  but  I  have  dined." 

"  What  then  ?  '  Break  out  into  a  second  course  of  mischief,' 
as  the  swan  recommends — swan  of  Avon,  sir !  iSTo  ?  '  Well, 
then,  I  charge  you  with  this  sup  of  sack.'  Are  you  going  far, 
if  I  may  take  the  liberty  to  ask  ?"  * 

"  To  London." 

"  Oh !"  said  the  traveller — while  his  young  companion  lifted 


1  ill.  <  ajctons: 

bis  eyes;  and  I  was  again  struck  with  their  remarkable  pene- 
tration and  brilliancy*. 

"  London  Is  the  besl  place  in  the  world  for  a  lad  of  spirit. 
See  life  there;  l  glass  of  fashion  and  mould  of  form.'  Fond  of 
the  play,  ^i^'.-", 

k*  I  oever  saw  one." 

"  1  'ossible  I'1  cried  the  gentleman,  dropping  the  handle  of  his 
knife,  and  bringing  up  the  point  horizontally:  "then,  young 
man,"  he  added  solemnly,  "you  have — but  I  won't  say  what 
you  have  to  see.  I  won't  say — no,  not  if  you  could  cover  this 
table  with  golden  guineas,  and  exclaim  with  the  generous  ar- 
dour so  engaging  in  youth,  'Mr.  Peacock,  these  are  yours  if  you 
will  only  say  what  I  have  to  see!'" 

I  laughed  outright — may  I  be  forgiven  for  the  boast,  but  I 
had  the  reputation  at  school  of  a  pleasant  laugh.  The  young 
man's  lace  grew  dark  at  the  sound:  he  pushed  back  his  plate 
and  sighed. 

"Why,"  continued  his  friend,  "my  companion  here,  who,  I 
suppose,  is  about  your  own  age,  lie  could  tell  you  what  a  play 
is — he  could  tell  you  what  life  is.  He  has  viewed  the  manners 
of  the  town :  'perused  the  traders,'  as  the  swan  poetically  re- 
marks.    Have  you  not,  my  lad,  eh  ?" 

Thus  directly  appealed  to,  the  boy  looked  up  with  a  smile 
of  scorn  on  his  lips — 

■•  Xes,  I  know  what  life  is,  and  I  say  that  life,  like  poverty, 
has  strange  bed-fellows.  Ask  me  what  life  is  now,  and  I  say 
a  melodrama;  ask  me  what  it  is  twenty  years  hence,  and  I  shall 
say — " 

"  A  farce  ?"  put  in  his  comrade. 

"  No,  a  tragedy — or  comedy  as  Moliere  wrote  it." 

"And  how  is  that?"  I  asked,  interested  and  somewhat  sur- 
prised at  the  tone  of  my  contemporary. 

w-  A\  nerc  the  play  ends  in  the  triumph  of  the  wittiest  rogue. 
My  friend  here  has  no  chance!" 

k- •  Praise  from  Sir  Hubert  Stanley,1  hem — yes,  Hal  Peacock 
may  he  witty,  but  lie  is  no  rogue." 

"Thai  was  noi  exactly  my  meaning,"  said  the  boy  drily. 

"'A  fico  for  your  meaning,'  as  the  swan  says. — Hallo,  you 
sir!     Bully  Host,  clear  the  table,— fresh  tumblers — hot  water 

— sugar — lemon, — and the  (tattle's  OU1  !     Smoke,  sir?" 

.Mr.  Peacock  "lit  red  me  a  cigar. 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  97 

Upon  my  refusal,  he  carefully  twirled  round  a  very  uninvit- 
ing specimen  of  some  fabulous  havannah — moistened  it  all  over, 
as  a  boa-constrictor  may  do  the  ox  he  prepares  for  deglutition ; 
bit  off  one  end,  and  lighting  the  other  from  a  little  machine 
for  that  purpose  which  he  drew  from  his  pocket,  he  was  soon 
absorbed  in  a  vigorous  effort  (which  the  damp  inherent  in  the 
weed  long  resisted)  to  poison  the  surrounding  atmosphere. 
Therewith  the  young  gentleman,  either  from  emulation  or  in 
self-defence,  extracted  from  his  own  pouch  a  cigar-case  of  not- 
able elegance, — being  of  velvet,  embroidered  apparently  by 
some  fair  hand,  for  "  From  Juliet"  was  very  legibly  worked 
thereon — selected  a  cigar  of  better  appearance  than  that  in 
favour  with  his  comrade,  and  seemed  quite  as  familiar  with 
the  tobacco  as  he  had  been  with  the  brandy. 

"  Fast,  sir — fast  lad  that,"  quoth  Mr.  Peacock,  in  the  short 
gasps  which  his  resolute  struggle  with  his  uninviting  victim 
alone  permitted — "nothing  but  (puff,  puff)  your  true  (suck, 
suck)  syl — syl — sylva — does  for  him.  Out,  by  the  Lord !  'the 
jaws  of  darkness  have  devoured  it  up ;'  "  and  again  Mr.  Pea- 
cock applied  to  his  phosphoric  machine.  This  time  patience 
and  perseverance  succeeded,  and  the  heart  of  the  cigar  re- 
sponded by  a  dull  red  spark  (leaving  the  sides  wholly  un- 
touched) to  the  indefatigable  ardour  of  its  wooer. 

This  feat  accomplished,  Mr.  Peacock  exclaimed  triumphant- 
ly, "  And  now,  what  say  you,  my  lads,  to  a  game  at  cards  ? — 
three  of  us — whist  and  a  dummy — nothing  better — eh  ?"  As 
he  spoke  he  produced  from  his  coat  pocket  a  red  silk  handker- 
chief, a  bunch  of  keys,  a  night-cap,  a  tooth-brush,  a  piece  of 
shaving-soap,  four  lumps  of  sugar,  the  remains  of  a  bun,  a  ra- 
zor, and  a  pack  of  cards.  Selecting  the  last,  and  returning  its 
motley  accompaniments  to  the  abyss  whence  they  had  emerged, 
he  turned  up,  with  a  jerk  of  his  thumb  and  finger,  the  knave 
of  clubs,  and  placing  it  on  the  top  of  the  rest,  slapped  the  cards 
emphatically  on  the  table. 

"  You  are  very  good,  but  I  don't  know  whist,"  said  I. 

"  Not  know  whist — not  been  to  a  play — not  smoke !  Then 
pray  tell  me,  young  man,"  said  he  majestically,  with  a  frown, 
"  what  on  earth  you  do  know  ?" 

Much  consternated  by  this  direct  appeal,  and  greatly  ashamed 
of  my  ignorance  of  the  cardinal  points  of  erudition  in  Mr.  Pea- 
cock's estimation,  I  hung  my  head  and  looked  down. 

E 


98  THE    CAXTONS: 

"Thai  is  right,"  renewed  Mr.  Peacock  more  benignly ;  "you 
have  the  ingenuous  shame  of  youth.  It  is  promising,  sir — 
'lowliness  is  young  ambition's  ladder,'  as  the  swan  says. 
Mount  the  lirst  step,  and  learn  whist — sixpenny  points  to  be- 
gin with." 

Notwithstanding  any  newness  in  actual  life,  I  had  had  the 
good  fortune  to  learn  a  little  of  the  way  before  me,  by  those 
much  slandered  guides  called  novels — works  which  are  often 
to  the  inner  world  what  maps  are  to  the  outer;  and  sundry 
recollections  of  "  Gil  Bias"  and  the  "Vicar  of  Wakefield"  came 
athwart  me.  I  had  no  wish  to  emulate  the  worthy  Moses,  and 
felt  that  I  might  not  have  even  the  shagreen  spectacles  to  boast 
of  in  my  negotiations  with  this  new  Mr.  Jenkinson.  Accord- 
ingly, shaking  my  head,  I  called  for  my  bill.  As  I  took  out 
my  purse — knit  by  my  mother — with  one  gold  piece  in  one 
corner,  and  sundry  silver  ones  in  the  other,  I  saw  that  the  eyes 
of  Mr.  Peacock  twinkled. 

"Poor  spirit,  sir!  poor  spirit,  young  man!  'This  avarice 
sticks  deep,'  as  the  swan  beautifully  observes.  '  Nothing  ven- 
ture, nothing  have.' " 

"  Nothing  have,  nothing  venture,"  I  returned,  plucking  up 
spirit. 

"  Nothing  have  ! — Young  sir,  do  you  doubt  my  solidity — 
my  capital — my  '  golden  joys  ?'  " 

"  Sir,  I  spoke  of  myself.     I  am  not  rich  enough  to  gamble." 

"  Gamble  !"  exclaimed  Mr.  Peacock,  hi  virtuous  indignation 
— "  Gamble  !  what  do  you  mean,  sir  ?  You  insult  me !"  and 
he  rose  threateningly,  and  clapped  his  white  hat  on  his  wig. 

"Pshaw!  let  him  alone,  Hal,"  said  the  boy  contemptuously. 
"  Sir,  if  he  is  impertinent,  thrash  him."     (This  was  to  me.) 

"Impertinent! — thrash!"  exclaimed  Mr.  Peacock,  waxing 
very  red;  but  catching  the  sneer  on  his  companion's  lip,  he 
sat  down,  and  subsided  into  sullen  silence. 

.Meanwhile  I  paid  my  bill.  This  duty,  rarely  a  cheerful  one, 
performed,  I  looked  round  for  my  knapsack,  and  perceived  that 
it  was  in  the  boy's  hands.  lie  was  very  coolly  reading  the 
address  which,  in  case  of  accidents,  I  prudently  placed  on  it — 
"Pisistratus  Caxton,  Esq., Hotel, Street,  Strand." 

I  took  my  knapsack  from  him,  more  surprised  at  such  a 
breach  of  good  manners  in  a  young  gentleman  who  knew  life 
bo  well,  than  I  should  have  been  at  a  similar  error  on  the  part 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  99 

of  Mr.  Peacock.  He  made  no  apology,  but  nodded  farewell, 
and  stretched  himself  at  full  length  on  the  bench.  Mr.  Pea- 
cock, now  absorbed  in  a  game  of  patience,  vouchsafed  no  re- 
turn to  my  parting  salutation,  and  in  another  moment  I  was 
alone  on  the  high-road.  My  thoughts  turned  long  upon  the 
young  man  I  had  left:  mixed  with  a  sort  of  instinctive  com- 
passionate foreboding  of  an  ill  future  for  one  with  such  habits, 
and  in  such  companionship,  I  felt  an  involuntary  admiration, 
less  even  for  his  good  looks  than  his  ease,  audacity,  and  the 
careless  superiority  he  assumed  over  a  comrade  so  much  older 
than  himself. 

The  day  was  far  gone  Avhen  I  saw  the  spires  of  a  town  at 
which  I  intended  to  rest  for  the  night.  The  horn  of  a  coach 
behind  made  me  turn  my  head,  and  as  the  vehicle  passed  me, 
I  saw  on  the  outside  Mr.  Peacock,  still  struggling  with  a  cigar 
— it  could  scarcely  be  the  same — and  his  young  friend  stretch- 
ed on  the  roof  amongst  the  luggage,  leaning  his  handsome 
head  on  his  hand,  and  apparently  unobservant  both  of  me  and 
every  one  else. 


CHAPTER  V. 

I  Air  apt — judging  egotistically,  perhaps  from  my  own  ex- 
perience— to  measure  a  young  man's  chance  of  what  is  termed 
practical  success  in  life,  by  what  may  seem  at  first  two  very 
vulgar  qualities — viz.  his  inquisitiveness  and  his  animal  vivaci- 
ty. A  curiosity  which  springs  forward  to  examine  everything 
new  to  his  information — a  nervous  activity  approaching  to  rest- 
lessness, which  rarely  allows  bodily  fatigue  to  interfere  with 
some  object  in  view — constitute,  in  my  mind,  very  profitable 
stock-in-hand  to  begin  the  world  with. 

Tired  as  I  was,  after  I  had  performed  my  ablutions,  and  re- 
freshed myself  in  the  little  coffee-room  of  the  inn  at  which  I 
put  up,  with  the  pedestrian's  best  beverage,  familiar  and  oft- 
calumniated  tea,  I  could  not  resist  the  temptation  of  the  broad, 
bustling  street,  which,  lighted  with  gas,  shone  on  me  through 
the  dim  windows  of  the  coffee-room.  I  had  never  before  seen 
a  large  town,  and  the  contrast  of  lamp-lit,  busy  night  in  the 
streets,  with  sober,  deserted  night  in  the  lanes  and  fields,, 
struck  me  forcibly. 


100  l m;   I  A2T0N8  ', 

I  sauntered  out,  therefore,  jostling  and  jostled,  now  gazing 
at  the  windows,  now  hurried  along  the  tide  of  life,  till  I  found 
myself  before  a  cook-shop,  round  which  clustered  a  small  knot 
of  housewives,  citizens,  and  hungry-looking  children.  While 
contemplating  this  group,  and  marvelling  how  it  came  to  pass 
that  the  staple  business  of  earth's  majority  is  how,  when,  and 
where  to  eat,  my  ear  was  struck  with  "  'In Troy  there  lies  the 
scene,'  as  the  illustrious  Will  remarks." 

Looking  round,  I  perceived  Mr.  Peacock  pointing  his  stick 
towards  an  open  doorway  next  to  the  cook-shop,  the  hall  be- 
yond which  was  lighted  with  gas,  while,  painted  in  black  let- 
ters on  a  pane  of  glass  over  the  door,  was  the  word  "Billiards." 

Suiting  the  action  to  the  word,  the  speaker  plunged  at  once 
into  the  aperture,  and  vanished.  The  boy-companion  was  fol- 
lowing more  slowly,  when  his  eve  caught  mine.  A  slight  blush 
came  over  his  dark  cheek ;  he  stopped,  and  leaning  against  the 
door-jambs,  gazed  on  me  hard  and  long  before  he  said — u  Well 
met  again,  sir !  You  find  it  hard  to  amuse  yourself  in  this 
dull  place;  the  nights  are  long  out  of  London." 

"Oh,"  said  I,  ingenuously,  "everything  here  amuses  me; 
the  lights,  the  shops,  the  crowd ;  but  then,  to  me  everything 
is  new." 

The  youth  came  from  his  lounging-place  and  moved  on,  as 
if  inviting  me  to  walk ;  while  he  answered,  rather  with  bitter 
sullenness  than  the  melancholy  his  words  expressed — 

"  One  thing,  at  least,  cannot  be  new  to  you ;  it  is  an  old 
truth  with  us  before  we  leave  the  nursery — 'Whatever  is  worth 
having  must  be  bought ;  ergo,  he  who  cannot  buy,  has  nothing 
worth  having.'  " 

"  I  don't  think,"  said  I  wisely,  "  that  the  things  best  worth 
having  can  be  bought  at  all.  You  see  that  poor  dropsical  jew- 
eller standing  before  his  shop-door:  his  shop  is  the  finest  in 
the  street, — and  I  dare  say  he  would  be  very  glad  to  give  it 
to  you  or  me  in  return  for  our  good  health  and  strong  legs. 
Oh  no!  I  think  with  my  father — 'All  that  are  worth  having 
are  given  to  all  ;'  that  is,  nature  and  labour." 

"Your  father  says  that  ;  and  you  go  by  what  your  father 
says!  Of  course,  all  lathers  have  preached  that  and  many 
other  good  doctrines,  Bince  Adam  preached  to  Cain;  but  I 
don't  Bee  thai  the  fath<  re  have  found  their  sons  very  credulous 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  101 

"  So  much  the  worse  for  the  sons,"  said  I  bluntly. 

"  Nature,"  continued  my  new  acquaintance,  without  attend- 
ing to  my  ejaculation — "  nature  indeed  does  give  us  much,  and 
nature  also  orders  each  of  us  how  to  use  her  gifts.  If  nature 
give  you  the  propensity  to  drudge,  you  will  drudge ;  if  she 
give  me  the  ambition  to  rise,  and  the  contempt  for  work,  I 
may  rise — but  I  certainly  shall  not  work." 

"  Oh,"  said  I,  "  you  agree  with  Squills,  I  suppose,  and  fancy 
we  are  all  guided  by  the  bumps  on  our  foreheads  ?" 

"  And  the  blood  in  our  veins,  and  our  mother's  milk.  AYe 
inherit  other  things  besides  gout  and  consumption.  So  you 
always  do  as  your  lather  tells  you !     Good  boy !" 

I  was  piqued.  Why  we  should  be  ashamed  of  being  taunt- 
ed for  goodness,  I  never  could  understand  ;  but  certainly  I  felt 
humbled.  However,  I  answered  sturdily — "If  you  had  as 
good  a  father  as  I  have,  you  would  not  think  it  so  very  extra- 
ordinary to  do  as  he  tells  you." 

"  Ah !  so  he  is  a  very  good  father,  is  he  ?  He  must  have  a 
great  trust  in  your  sobriety  and  steadiness  to  let  you  wander 
about  the  world  as  he  does." 

"I  am  going  to  join  him  in  London." 

"  In  London !     Oh,  does  he  live  there  ?" 

"  He  is  going  to  live  there  for  some  time." 

"  Then,  perhaps,  Ave  may  meet.     I,  too,  am  going  to  town." 

"  Oh,  we  shall  be  sure  to  meet  there !"  said  I,  with  frank 
gladness  ;  for  my  interest  in  the  young  man  was  not  diminish- 
ed by  his  conversation,  however  much  I  disliked  the  senti- 
ments it  expressed. 

The  lad  laughed — and  his  laugh  was  peculiar:  it  was  low, 
musical,  but  hollow  and  artificial. 

"  Sure  to  meet !  London  is  a  large  place :  where  shall  you 
be  found?" 

I  gave  him,  without  scruple,  the  address  of  the  hotel  at 
which  I  expected  to  find  my  father ;  although  his  deliberate 
inspection  of  my  knapsack  must  already  have  apprised  him 
of  that  address.  He  listened  attentively,  and  repeated  it  twice 
over,  as  if  to  impress  it  on  his  memory;  and  we  both  walked 
on  in  silence,  till,  turning  up  a  small  passage,  we  suddenly 
found  ourselves  in  a  large  churchyard, — a  flagged  path  stretch- 
ed diagonally  across  it  towards  the  market-place,  on  which  it 
bordered.     In  this  churchyard,  upon  a  grave-stone,  sat  a  young 


102  i  in:  i  A.vniNs: 

Savoyard;  his  hurdy-gurdy,  or  whatever  else  his  instrument 
might  be  called,  was  on  his  lap  ;  and  he  was  gnawing  his  crust, 
and  feeding  some  poor  little  white  mice  (standing  on  their 
hind  logs  on  the  hurdy-gurdy)  as  merrily  as  if  be  bad  cbosen 
the  gayest  resting-place  in  the  world. 

We  both  stopped.  The  Savoyard,  seeing  us,  put  bis  arch 
bead  on  one  side,  showed  all  his  white  teeth  in  that  happy 
smile  so  peculiar  to  his  race,  and  in  which  poverty  seems  to 
beg  so  blithely,  and  gave  the  handle  of  bis  instrument  a  turn. 

"  Poor  child !"  said  I. 

"  Aha,  you  pity  him  !  but  why  ?  According  to  your  rule, 
Mr.  Caxton,  he  is  not  so  much  to  be  pitied  ;  the  dropsical  jew- 
eller would  give  him  as  much  for  his  limbs  and  health  as  for 
ours !  How  is  it — answer  me,  son  of  so  wise  a  father — that 
no  one  pities  the  dropsical  jeweller,  and  all  pity  the  healthy 
Savoyard?  Is  it,  sir,  because  there  is  a  stern  truth  which  is 
stronger  than  all  Spartan  lessons — Poverty  is  the  master-ill  of 
the  world  ?  Look  round.  Does  poverty  leave  its  signs  over 
the  graves  ?  Look  at  that  large  tomb  fenced  round ;  read 
that  long  inscription! — 'Virtue' — 'best  of  husbands' — 'affec- 
tionate father' — 'inconsolable  grief — 'sleeps  in  the  joyful 
hope,'  etc.  &c.  Do  you  suppose  these  stoneless  mounds  hide 
no  dust  of  what  were  men  just  as  good  ?  But  no  epitaph  tells 
their  virtues,  bespeaks  their  wives'  grief,  or  promises  joyful 
hope  to  them !" 

"Does  it  matter?  Does  God  care  for  the  epitaph  and 
tomb-stone  ?" 

"  Date  mi  qualche  cosa!"  said  the  Savoyard  in  his  touching 
patois,  still  smiling,  and  holding  out  bis  little  hand;  therein  I 
dropped  a  small  coin.  The  boy  evinced  his  gratitude  by  a 
new  turn  of  the  hurdy-gurdy. 

"  That  is  not  labour,"  said  my  companion ;  "  and  had  you 
found  him  at  work,  you  had  given  him  nothing.  I  too  have 
my  instrument  to  play  upon,  and  my  mice  to  see  after. 
Allien!" 

He  waved  his  hand,  and  strode  irreverently  over  the  graves 
buck  in  the  direction  we  had  come. 

I  stood  before  tin-  fine  lomb  with  its  line  epitaph;  the 
Savoyard  looked  at  me  wistlully. 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  103 


CHAPTER  VI. 

The  Savoyard  looked  at  me  wistfully.  I  wished  to  enter 
into  conversation  with  him.  That  was  not  easy.  However,  I 
began : — 

Pisistratus. — "  You  must  be  often  hungry  enough,  my  poor 
boy.     Do  the  mice  feed  you  ?" 

Savoyard  puts  his  head  on  one  side,  shakes  it,  and  strokes 
his  mice. 

Pisistratus. — "  You  are  very  fond  of  the  mice  ;  they  are 
your  only  friends,  I  fear." 

Savoyard,  evidently  understanding  Pisistratus,  rubs  his 
face  gently  against  the  mice,  then  puts  them  softly  down  on  a 
grave,  and  gives  a  turn  to  the  hurdy-gurdy.  The  mice  play 
unconcernedly  over  the  grave. 

Pisistratus,  pointing  first  to  the  beasts,  then  to  the  instru- 
ment.— "Which  do  you  like  best,  the  mice  or  the  hurdy- 
gurdy?" 

Savoyard  shows  his  teeth — considers — stretches  himself  on 
the  grass — plays  with  the  mice — and  answers  volubly. 

Pisistratus,  by  the  help  of  Latin  comprehending  that  the 
Savoyard  says  that  the  mice  are  alive,  and  the  hurdy-gurdy  is 
not — "  Yes,  a  live  friend  is  better  than  a  dead  one.  Mortua 
est  hurda-gurda !" 

Savoyard  shakes  his  head  vehemently.  "  X6 — no  !  Eccel- 
lenza,  non  e  morta !"  and  strikes  up  a  lively  air  on  the  slander- 
ed instrument.  The  Savoyard's  face  brightens — he  looks  hap- 
py :  the  mice  run  from  the  grave  into  his  bosom. 

Pisistratus,  affected,  and  putting  the  question  in  Latin. — 
"  Have  you  a  father  ?" 

Savoyard,  with  his  face  overcast, — "  X6 — Eccellenza !"  then 
pausing  a  little,  he  says  briskly,  "Si  si !"  and  plays  a  solemn 
air  on  the  hurdy-gurdy — stops — rests  one  hand  on  the  instru- 
ment, and  raises  the  other  to  heaven. 

Pisistratus  understands :  the  father  is  like  the  hurdy-gur- 
dy, at  once  dead  and  living.  The  mere  form  is  a  dead  thing, 
but  the  music  lives.  Pisistratus  drops  another  small  piece  of 
silver  on  the  ground,  and  turns  away. 


L04  i  in:  CAXTON8. 

God  help  and  (lod  bless  thee, Savoyard.  Thou  hast  done 
Pisistratus  all  the  good  in  the  world.  Thou  hast  corrected  the 
hard  wisdom  ofthe  young  gentleman  in  the  velveteen  jacket ; 
Pisistratus  is  a  better  lad  for  having  stopped  to  listen  to  thee. 

I  regained  the  entrance  to  the  churchyard — I  looked  back: 
there  sal  the  Savoyard,  still  amidst  men's  graves,  but  under 
God's  sky.  He  was  still  looking  at  me  wistfully;  and  when 
he  caught  my  eye,  he  pressed  his  hand  to  his  heart,  and  smiled. 
God  help  and  God  bless  thee,  young  Savoyard. 


PART  FIFTH. 

CHAPTER  I. 

Ix  setting  off  the  next  morning,  the  Boots,  whose  heart  I 
had  won  by  an  extra  sixpence  for  calling  me  betimes,  good- 
naturedly  informed  me  that  I  might  save  a  mile  of  the  jour- 
ney, and  have  a  very  pleasant  walk  into  the  bargain,  if  I  took 
the  footpath  through  a  gentleman's  park,  the  lodge  of  which  I 
should  see  about  seven  miles  from  the  town. 

"  And  the  grounds  are  showed  too,"  said  the  Boots,  "  if  so 
be  you  has  a  mind  to  stay  and  see  'em.  But  don't  you  go  to 
the  gardener,  he'll  want  half-a-crown  ;  there's  an  old  'oman  at 
the  lodge,  who  will  show  you  all  that's  worth  seeing — the 
walks  and  the  big  cascade — for  a  tizzy.  You  may  make  use 
of  my  name,"  he  added  proudly — "  Bob,  boots  at  the  Lion. 
She  be  a  Aaunt  o'  mine,  and  she  minds  them  that  come  from 
me  pertiklerly." 

Not  doubting  that  the  purest  philanthropy  actuated  these 
counsels,  I  thanked  my  shock-headed  friend,  and  asked  care- 
lessly to  whom  the  park  belonged. 

"  To  Muster  Trevanion,  the  great  parliament  man,"  answered 
the  Boots.     "  You  has  heard  o'  him,  I  guess,  sir  ?" 

I  shook  my  head,  surprised  every  hour  more  and  more  to 
find  how  very  little  there  was  in  it. 

"  They  takes  in  the  Moderate  Maris  Journal  at  the  Lamb ; 
and  they  say  in  the  tap  there  that  he's  one  of  the  cleverest 
chaps  in  the  House  o'  Commons,"  continued  the  Boots  in  a 
confidential  whisper.  "  But  we  takes  in  the  Peoples  Thunder- 
bolt at  the  Lion,  and  we  knows  better  this  Muster  Trevanion  : 
he's  but  a  trimmer — milk  and  water, — no  A  orator, — not  the 
right  sort, — you  understand  ?" 

Perfectly  satisfied  that  I  understood  nothing  about  it,  I  smiled, 
and  said,  "  Oh  yes ;"  and  slipping  on  my  knapsack,  commenced 
my  adventures  ;  the  Boots  bawling  after  me,  "  Mind,  sir,  you 
tells  Aaunt  I  sent  you." 

The  town  was  onlv  languidly  putting  forth  symptoms  of  re- 

E  2 


106  THE  <  axtons  : 

turning  life  as  T  strode  through  the  streets;  a  pale  sickly  un- 
wholesome look  "ii  the  face  of  the  slothful  Phoebus  had  sue- 
ceeded  the  fe\  erish  hectic  of  the  past  night :  the  artisans  whom 
I  met  glided  by  me  haggard  and  dejected;  a  hw  early  shops 
were  alone  open;  one  <>r  two  drunken  men,  emerging  from  the 
lanes,  sallied  homeward  with  broken  pipes  in  their  mouths; 
hill-,  with  large  capitals,  calling  attention  to  "Best  family  teas 
at  4*.  a-pound;"  "the  arrival  of  Mr.  Sloman's  caravan  of  wild 
1  ^asts  ;"  and  Dr.  Do'ein's  "Paracelsian  Pills  of  Immortality," 
Btared  out  dull  and  uncheering  from  the  wralls  of  tenantless  di- 
lapidated houses,  in  that  chill  sunrise  which  favours  no  illusion. 
1  was  glad  when  I  had  left  the  town  behind  me,  and  saw  the 
reapers  in  the  cornfields,  and  heard  the  chirp  of  the  birds.  I 
arrived  at  the  lodge  of  which  the  Boots  had  spoken  :  a  pretty 
rustic  building  half  concealed  by  a  belt  of  plantations,  with  two 
large  iron  gates  for  the  owner's  friends,  and  a  small  turnstile 
for  the  public,  who,  by  some  strange  neglect  on  his  part,  or  sad 
want  of  interest  with  the  neighbouring  magistrates,  had  still 
preserved  a  right  to  cross  the  rich  man's  domains,  and  look  on 
his  grandeur,  limited  to  compliance  with  a  reasonable  request 
mildly  stated  on  the  notice-board,  "  to  keep  to  the  paths."  As 
it  was  not  yet  eight  o'clock,  I  had  plenty  of  time  before  me  to 
see  the  grounds,  and  profiting  by  the  economical  hint  of  the 
Boots,  I  entered  the  lodge,  and  inquired  for  the  old  lady  who 
was  //aunt  to  Mr.  Bob.  A  young  woman,  wrho  was  busied  in 
preparing  breakfast,  nodded  witli  great  civility  to  this  request, 
and,  hastening  to  a  bundle  of  clothes  which  I  then  perceived 
in  the  corner,  she  cried,  "  Grandmother,  here's  a  gentleman  to 
see  the  cascade." 

The  bundle  of  clothes  then  turned  round,  and  exhibited  a 
human  countenance,  which  lighted  up  with  great  intelligence 
as  the  granddaughter,  turning  to  me,  said  with  simplicity — 
"  She's  old,  honest  cretur,  but  she  still  likes  to  earn  a  sixpence, 
sir;"  and  taking  a  crutch-staif  in  her  hand  while  her  grand- 
daughter put  a  neat  bonnet  on  her  head,  this  industrious  gen- 
tlewoman sallied  out  at  a  pace  which  surprised  me. 

I  attempted  to  enter  into  conversation  with  my  guide;  but 
Bhe  'lid  not  seem  much  inclined  to  be  sociable,  and  the  beauty 
of  the  glades  and  groves  which  now  spread  before  my  eyes 
reconciled  me  to  silence. 

I  have  seen  many  line  places  since  then,  but  I  do  not  remem- 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  107 

ber  to  have  seen  a  landscape  more  beautiful  in  its  peculiar  En- 
glish character  than  that  which  I  now  gazed  on.  It  had  none 
of  the  feudal  characteristics  of  ancieut  parks,  with  giant  oaks, 
fantastic  pollards,  glens  covered  with  fern,  and  deer  grouped 
upon  the  slopes ;  on  the  contrary,  in  spite  of  some  fine  trees, 
chiefly  beech,  the  impression  conveyed  was,  that  it  was  a  new 
place  —  a  made  place.  You  might  see  ridges  on  the  lawns 
which  showed  where  hedges  had  been  removed ;  the  pastures 
were  parcelled  out  in  divisions  by  new  wire-fences ;  young 
plantations,  planned  with  exquisite  taste,  but  without  the  ven- 
erable formality  of  avenues  and  quincunxes,  by  which  you 
know  the  parks  that  date  from  Elizabeth  and  James,  diversified 
the  rich  extent  of  verdure ;  instead  of  deer,  were  short-horned 
cattle  of  the  finest  breed — sheep  that  would  have  won  the  prize 
at  an  agricultural  show.  Everywhere  there  was  the  evidence 
of  improvement — energy — capital ;  but  capital  clearly  not  em- 
ployed for  the  mere  purpose  of  return.  The  ornamental  was 
too  conspicuously  predominant  amidst  the  lucrative,  not  to  say 
eloquently — "  The  owner  is  willing  to  make  the  most  of  his 
land,  but  not  the  most  of  his  money." 

But  the  old  woman's  eagerness  to  earn  sixpence  had  impress- 
ed me  unfavourably  as  to  the  character  of  the  master.  "  Here," 
thought  I,  "  are  all  the  signs  of  riches  ;  and  yet  this  poor  old 
woman,  living  on  the  very  threshold  of  opulence,  is  in  want  of 
a  sixpence." 

These  surmises,  in  the  indulgence  of  which  I  piqued  myself 
on  my  penetration,  were  strengthened  into  convictions  by  the 
few  sentences  which  I  succeeded  at  last  in  eliciting  from  the 
old  woman. 

"  Mr.  Trevanion  must  be  a  rich  man  ?"  said  I. 

"  O  ay,  rich  eno' !"  grumbled  my  guide. 

"  And,"  said  I,  surveying  the  extent  of  shrubbery  or  dressed 
ground  through  which  our  way  wound,  now  emerging  into 
lawns  and  glades,  now  belted  by  rare  garden-trees,  now  (as 
every  inequality  of  the  ground  was  turned  to  advantage  in  the 
landscape)  sinking  into  the  dell,  now  climbing  up  the  slopes, 
and  now  confining  the  view  to  some  object  of  graceful  art  or 
enchanting  nature — "And,"  said  I,  "he  must  employ  many 
hands  here — plenty  of  work,  eh  ?" 

"  Ay,  ay — I  don't  say  that  he  don't  find  work  for  those  who 
want  it.     But  it  ain't  the  same  place  it  wor  in  my  day." 


im:   CAXTONS  : 

"Yon  remember  it  in  other  hands, then?" 

"Ay,  ay!  When  the  Hogtons  had  it,  honest  folk!  My 
good  in:in  was  the  gardener — none  of  those  set-aip  fine  gentle- 
men who  can't  put  hand  to  a  spade  I" 

Poor  faithful  old  woman! 

1  began  to  hate  the  unknown  proprietor.  Here  clearly  was 
some  mushroom  usurper  who  had  bought  out  the  old  simple 
hospitable  family,  neglected  its  ancient  servants,  left  them  to 
■arn  tizzies  by  showing  waterfalls,  and  insulted  their  eyes  by 
his  selfish  wealth. 

"  There's  the  water  all  sptl't— it  warn't  so  in  my  day,"  said 
the  guide. 

A  rivulet,  whose  murmur  I  had  long  heard,  now  stole  sud- 
denly into  view,  and  gave  to  the  scene  the  crowning  charm. 
As,  relapsing  into  silence,  we  tracked  its  sylvan  course,  under 
dipping  chestnuts  and  shady  limes,  the  house  itself  emerged  on 
the  opposite  side — a  modern  building  of  white  stone,  with  the 
noblest  Corinthian  portico  I  ever  saw  in  this  country. 

"  A  fine  house,  indeed,"  said  I.  "  Is  Mr.  Trevanion  here 
much  ?" 

"  Ay,  ay — I  don't  mean  to  say  that  he  goes  away  altogether, 
1  >ut  it  ain't  as  it  wor  in  my  day,  when  the  Hogtons  lived  here 
all  the  year  round  in  their  warm  house, — not  that  one." 

Good  old  woman,  and  these  poor  banished  Hogtons !  thought 
I :  hateful  parvenu !  I  was  pleased  when  a  curve  in  the  shrub- 
beries shut  out  the  house  from  view,  though  in  reality  bringing 
us  nearer  to  it.  And  the  boasted  cascade,  whose  roar  I  had 
heard  for  some  moments,  came  in  sight. 

Amidst  the  Alps,  such  a  waterfall  would  have  been  insignif- 
icant, but  contrasting  ground  highly  dressed,  with  no  other 
bold  features,  its  effect  was  striking,  and  even  grand.  The 
banks  were  here  narrowed  and  compressed  ;  rocks,  partly  nat- 
ural, partly  no  doubt  artificial,  gave  a  rough  aspect  to  the  mar- 
gin ;  and  the  cascade  fell  from  a  considerable  height  into  rapid 
waters,  which  my  guide  mumbled  out  were  "  mortal  deep." 

"There  wor  a  madman  leapl  over  where  you  be  standing," 

lid  the  old  woman,  "two  years  ago  last  June." 
•  A  madman  !  why,"  said  [,observing,  with  an  eye  practised 
in  the  gymnasium  of  the  Hellenic  Institute,  the  narrow  space 
of  the  bunks  over  the  gulf — "  why,  my  good  lady,  it  need  not 
be  a  madman  to  perform  that  leap." 


( 


A    FAMILY    PICTUEE.  109 

And  so  saying,  with  one  of  those  sudden  impulses  which  it 
would  be  wrong  to  ascribe  to  the  noble  quality  of  courage,  I 
drew  back  a  few  steps,  and  cleared  the  abyss.  But  when  from 
the  other  side  I  looked  back  at  what  I  had  done,  and  saw  that 
failure  had  been  death,  a  sickness  came  over  me,  and  I  felt  as  if 
I  would  not  have  releapt  the  gulf  to  become  lord  of  the  domain. 

"And  how  am  I  to  get  back?"  said  I  in  a  forlorn  voice  to 
the  old  woman,  who  stood  staring  at  me  on  the  other  side — 
k-  All !  I  see  there  is  a  bridge  below  ?" 

"  But  you  can't  go  over  the  bridge ;  there's  a  gate  on  it ; 
master  keeps  the  key  himself.  You  are  in  the  private  grounds 
now.  Dear — dear  !  the  squire  would  be  so  angry  if  he  knew. 
You  must  go  back ;  and  they'll  see  you  from  the  house ! 
Dear  me  ! — dear — dear  !  "What  shall  I  do  ?  Can't  you  leap 
back  again?" 

Moved  by  these  piteous  exclamations,  and  not  wishing  to 
subject  the  poor  old  lady  to  the  wrath  of  a  master  evidently  an 
unfeeling  tyrant,  I  resolved  to  pluck  up  courage  and  releap  the 
dangerous  abyss. 

"  Oh  yes — never  fear,"  said  I,  therefore.  "  What's  been  done 
once  ought  to  be  done  twice,  if  needful.  Just  get  out  of  my 
way,  will  you  ?" 

And  I  receded  several  paces  over  a  ground  much  too  rough 
to  favour  my  run  for  a  spring.  But  my  heart  knocked  against 
my  ribs.  I  felt  that  impulse  can  do  wonders  where  prepara- 
tion fails. 

"  You  had  best  be  quick,  then,"  said  the  old  woman. 

Horrid  old  woman  !  I  began  to  esteem  her  less.  I  set  my 
teeth,  and  was  about  to  rush  on,  when  a  voice  close  beside  me 
said — 

"  Stay,  young  man  ;  I  will  let  you  through  the  gate." 

I  turned  round  sharply,  and  saw  close  by  my  side,  in  great 
wonder  that  I  had  not  seen  him  before,  a  man,  whose  homely 
(but  not  working)  dress  seemed  to  intimate  his  station  as  that 
of  the  head  gardener,  of  whom  my  guide  had  spoken.  He  was 
seated  on  a  stone  under  a  chestnut  tree,  with  an  ugly  cur  at  his 
feet,  who  snarled  at  me  as  I  turned. 

"  Thank  you,  my  man,"  said  I  joyfully.  "I  confess  frankly 
that  I  was  very  much  afraid  of  that  leap." 

"  Ho  !  Yet  you  said,  what  can  be  done  once  can  be  done 
twice." 


110  Tin:   CAXTONS  : 

MI  did  noi  say  ii  could  be  done,  but  ought  to  be  done." 

"  Humph  !     That's  better  put." 

Sere  the  maD  rose;  the  <  I  *  >  .lt  came  and  Bmell  my  legs,  and 
then,  as  Lf  satisfied  with  my  respectability,  wagged  the  stump 
of  his  tail. 

I  looked  across  the  waterfall  for  the  old  woman,  and,  to  my 
Burprise,  saw  her  hobbling  back  as  fast  as  she  could. 

"  All !"  said  I,  laughing,  "  the  poor  old  thing  is  afraid  you'll 
t  ill  her  master — for  you're  the  head  gardener,  I  suppose  ?  ]  Jut 
I  am  the  only  person  to  blame.  Pray  say  that,  if  you  mention 
the  circumstance  at  all!"  and  I  drew  out  half-a-crown,  which  I 
proffered  to  my  new  conductor. 

lie  put  back  the  money  with  a  low  "Humph — not  amiss." 
Then,  in  a  louder  voice,  "  Xo  occasion  to  bribe  me,  young  man ; 
I  Baw  it  all." 

"  I  fear  your  master  is  rather  hard  to  the  poor  Ilogtons'  old 
servants." 

"  Is  he  ?  Oh !  humph !  my  master.  Mr.  Trevanion  you 
mean  ?" 

"Yes." 

"  Well,  I  dare  say  people  say  so.  This  is  the  way."  And  he 
led  me  down  a  little  glen  away  from  the  fall. 

Everybody  must  have  observed,  that  after  he  has  incurred 
or  escaped  a  great  danger,  his  spirits  rise  wonderfully — he  is 
in  a  state  of  pleasing  excitement.  So  it  was  with  me.  I  talk- 
ed to  the  gardener  a  caiur  ouvert,  as  the  French  say :  and  I  did 
not  observe  that  his  short  monosyllables  in  rejoinder  all  served 
to  draw  out  my  little  history — my  journey,  its  destination  ;  my 
schooling  under  Dr.  Herman,  and  my  father's  Great  Book.  I 
was  only  made  somewhat  suddenly  aware  of  the  familiarity 
that  had  sprung  up  between  us,  when,  just  as,  having  perform- 
ed  a  circuitous  meander,  we  regained  the  stream  and  stood  be- 
fore an  iron  gate,  set  in  an  arch  of  rock-w<>rk,  my  companion 
said  simply — "And  your  name,  young  gentleman?  What's 
your  name  ?" 

I  hesitated  a  moment;  but  having  heard  that  such  commu- 
nications  \v< ire  usually  made  by  the  visitors  of  show  places,  I 
answered — c*  ( )h  I  a  very  venerable  one,  if  your  master  is  what 
they  call  a  bibliomaniac — Caxton." 

"Caxton!"  cried  the  gardener,  with  some  vivacity:  "there 
i-  a  Cumberland  family  of  thai  name — " 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  Ill 

"  That's  mine ;  and  my  Uncle  Roland  is  the  head  of  that 
family." 

"  And  you  are  the  son  of  Augustine  Caxton  ?" 

"  I  am.     You  have  heard  of  my  dear  father,  then  ?" 

"  We  will  not  pass  by  the  gate  now.  Follow  me — this  way ;" 
and  my  guide,  turning  abruptly  round,  strode  up  a  narrow 
path,  and  the  house  stood  a  hundred  yards  before  me  ere  I  re- 
covered my  surprise. 

"  Pardon  me,"  said  I, "  but  where  are  we  going,  my  good 
friend  ?" 

"  Good  friend — good  friend !  Well  said,  sir.  You  are  go- 
ing amongst  good  friends.  I  was  at  college  with  your  father. 
I  loved  him  well.  I  knew  a  little  of  your  uncle  too.  My  name 
is  Trevanion." 

Blind  young  fool  that  I  was !  The  moment  my  guide  told 
his  name,  I  was  struck  with  amazement  at  my  unaccountable 
mistake.  The  small,  insignificant  figure  took  instant  dignity ; 
the  homely  dress,  of  rough  dark  broadcloth,  was  the  natural 
and  becoming  dishabille  of  a  country  gentleman  in  his  own 
demesnes.  Even  the  ugly  cur  became  a  Scotch  terrier  of  the 
rarest  breed. 

My  guide  smiled  good-naturedly  at  my  stupor ;  and  patting 
me  on  the  shoulder,  said — 

"  It  is  the  gardener  you  must  apologize  to,  not  me.  He  is  a 
very  handsome  fellow,  six  feet  high." 

I  had  not  found  my  tongue  before  we  had  ascended  a  broad 
flight  of  stairs  under  the  portico ;  passed  a  spacious  hall,  adorn- 
ed with  statues,  and  fragrant  with  large  orange-trees ;  and,  en- 
tering a  small  room  hung  with  pictures,  in  which  were  ar- 
ranged all  the  appliances  for  breakfast,  my  companion  said  to 
a  lady,  who  rose  from  behind  the  tea-urn,  "  My  dear  Ellinor,  I 
introduce  to  you  the  son  of  our  old  friend  Augustine  Caxton. 
Make  him  stay  with  us  as  long  as  he  can.  Young  gentleman, 
in  Lady  Ellinor  Trevanion  think  that  you  see  one  whom  you 
ought  to  know  well — family  friendships  should  descend." 

My  host  said  these  last  words  in  an  imposing  tone,  and  then 
pounced  on  a  letter-bag  on  the  table,  drew  forth  an  immense 
heap  of  letters  and  newspapers,  threw  himself  into  an  arm- 
chair, and  seemed  perfectly  forgetful  of  my  existence. 

The  lady  stood  a  moment  in  mute  surprise,  and  I  saw  that 
she  changed  colour  from  pale  to  red,  and  red  to  pale,  before 


1  L2  THE   CAXTONS  : 

she  came  forward  with  the  enchanting  grace  of  unaffected 
kindness,  tooi  me  by  the  hand,  drew  me  to  a  seal  nexl  to  her 
own,  and  asked  so  cordially  after  my  father,  my  uncle,  my  whole 
family,  that  in  live  minutes  I  felt  myself  at  home.  Lady  El- 
linor  listened  with  a  smile  (though  with  moistened  eyes,  which 
she  wiped  every  now  and  then)  to  my  artless  details.  At 
length  she  said — 

"Have  you  never  heard  your  father  speak  of  me — I  mean 
of  us — of  the  Trevanions  ?" 

lw  Never,"  said  I,  bluntly :  "  and  that  would  puzzle  me,  only 
my  dear  father,  you  know,  is  not  a  great  talker." 

"  Indeed !  he  was  very  animated  when  I  knew  him,"  said 
Lady  Ellinor ;  and  she  turned  her  head  and  sighed. 

At  this  moment  there  entered  a  young  lady,  so  fresh,  so 
blooming,  so  lovely,  that  every  other  thought  vanished  out  of 
my  head  at  once.  She  came  in  singing,  as  gay  as  a  bird,  and 
seeming  to  my  adoring  sight  quite  as  native  to  the  skies. 

"  Fanny,"  said  Lady  Ellinor,  "  shake  hands  with  Mr.Caxton, 
the  son  of  one  whom  I  have  not  seen  since  I  was  a  little  older 
than  you,  but  whom  I  remember  as  if  it  were  but  yesterday." 

Miss  Fanny  blushed  and  smiled,  and  held  out  her  hand  with 
an  easy  frankness  which  I  in  vain  endeavored  to  imitate.  Dur- 
ing breakfast,  Mr.  Trevanion  continued  to  read  his  letters  and 
glance  over  the  papers  with  an  occasional  ejaculation  of 
"  Pish  !" — "  Stuff!" — between  the  interval  in  which  he  mechan- 
ically swallowed  his  tea,  or  some  small  morsels  of  dry  toast. 
Then  rising  with  a  suddenness  which  characterized  his  move- 
ments, he  stood  on  his  hearth  for  a  few  moments  buried  in 
thought ;  and  now  that  a  large-brimmed  hat  was  removed  from 
his  brow,  and  the  abruptness  of  his  first  movement,  with  the 
s  -lateness  of  his  after  pause,  arrested  my  curious  attention,  I 
was  more  than  ever  ashamed  of  my  mistake.  It  was  a  care- 
worn, eager,  and  ye1  musing  countenance,  hollow-eyed,  and 
with  deep  lines;  but  it  was  one  of  those  faces  which  take  dig- 
nity and  refinement  from  that  mental  cultivation  which  distin- 
guishes  the  true  aristocrat — viz.  the  highly  educated,  acutely 
intelligent  man.  Very  handsome  might  that  face  have  been  in 
youth,  for  the  features,  though  small,  were  exquisitely  defined; 
the  brow,  partially  bald,  was  noble  and  massive,  and  there  was 
almosl  feminine  delicacy  in  the  curve  of  the  lip.  The  whole 
expression  of  the  face  was  commanding,  but  sad.     Often,  as 


A    FAMILY   PICTURE.  113 

my  experience  of  life  increased,  have  I  thought  to  trace  upon 
that  expressive  visage  the  history  of  energetic  ambition  curbed 
by  a  fastidious  philosophy  and  a  scrupulous  conscience ;  but 
then  all  that  I  could  see  was  a  vague,  dissatisfied  melancholy, 
which  dejected  me  I  knew  not  why. 

Presently  Trevanion  returned  to  the  table,  collected  his  let- 
ters, moved  slowly  towards  the  door,  and  vanished. 

His  wife's  eyes  followed  him  tenderly.  Those  eyes  remind- 
ed me  of  my  mother's,  as  I  verily  believe  did  all  eyes  that  ex- 
pressed affection.  I  crept  nearer  to  her,  and  longed  to  press 
the  white  hand  that  lay  so  listless  before  me. 

"  Will  you  walk  out  with  us  ?"  said  Miss  Trevanion,  turning 
to  me.  I  bowed,  and  in  a  few  minutes  I  found  myself  alone. 
While  the  ladies  left  me,  for  their  shawls  and  bonnets,  I  took 
up  the  newspapers  which  Mr.  Trevanion  had  thrown  on  the 
table,  by  way  of  something  to  do.  My  eye  was  caught  by  his 
own  name ;  it  occurred  often,  and  in  all  the  papers.  There 
was  contemptuous  abuse  in  one,  high  eulogy  in  another ;  but 
one  passage,  in  a  journal  that  seemed  to  aim  at  impartiality, 
struck  me  so  much  as  to  remain  in  my  memory ;  and  I  am  sure 
that  I  can  still  quote  the  sense,  though  not  the  exact  words. 
The  paragraph  ran  somewhat  thus : — 

"In  the  present  state  of  parties,  our  contemporaries  have, 
not  unnaturally,  devoted  much  space  to  the  claims  or  demerits 
of  Mr.  Trevanion.  It  is  a  name  that  stands  unquestionably 
high  in  the  House  of  Commons ;  but,  as  unquestionably,  it 
commands  little  sympathy  in  the  country.  Mr.  Trevanion  is 
essentially  and  emphatically  a  member  of  parliament.  He  is  a 
close  and  ready  debater ;  he  is  an  admirable  chairman  in  com- 
mittees. Though  never  in  office,  his  long  experience  of  public 
life,  his  gratuitous  attention  to  public  business,  have  ranked 
him  high  among  those  practical  politicians  from  whom  minis- 
ters are  selected.  A  man  of  spotless  character  and  excellent 
intentions,  no  doubt,  he  must  be  considered ;  and  in  him  any 
cabinet  would  gain  an  honest  and  a  useful  member.  There 
ends  all  we  can  say  in  his  praise.  As  a  speaker  he  wants  the 
fire  and  enthusiasm  which  engage  the  popular  sympathies. 
He  has  the  ear  of  the  House,  not  the  heart  of  the  country. 
An  oracle  on  subjects  of  mere  business,  in  the  great  questions 
of  policy  he  is  comparatively  a  failure.  He  never  embraces 
any  party  heartily ;  he  never  espouses  any  question  as  if  whol- 


1  14  THE  CAXTONS  : 

ly  in  earnest.  The  moderation  on  which  he  is  said  to  pique 
himself,  often  exhibits  itsdi"  in  fastidious  crotchets,  and  an  at- 
tempt at  philosophical  originality  of  candour,  which  has  long 
obtained  him,  with  his  enemies,  the  reputation  of  a  trimmer. 
Such  a  man  circumstances  may  throw  into  temporary  power; 
but  can  he  command  lasting  influence?  Xo:  let  Mr.  Trevanion 
remain  in  what  nature  and  position  assign  as  his  proper  post — 
that  of  an  upright,  independent,  able  member  of  Parliament ; 
conciliating  sensible  men  on  both  sides, -when  party  runs  into 
extremes.  lie  is  undone  as  a  cabinet  minister.  His  scruples 
would  break  up  any  government;  and  his  want  of  decision — 
when,  as  in  all  human  affairs,  some  errors  must  be  conceded  to 
obtain  a  great  good — would  shipwreck  his  own  fame." 

I  had  just  got  to  the  end  of  this  paragraph  when  the  ladies 
returned. 

My  hostess  observed  the  newspaper  in  my  hand,  and  said, 
with  a  constrained  smile,  "Some  attack  on  Mr.  Trevanion,  I 
suppose  ?" 

"  No,"  said  I,  awkwardly ;  for,  perhaps,  the  paragraph  that 
appeared  to  me  so  impartial,  was  the  most  galling  attack  of 
all—"  Xo,  not  exactly." 

"  I  never  read  the  papers  now,  at  least  what  are  called  the 
leading  articles — it  is  too  painful :  and  once  they  gave  me  so 
much  pleasure — that  was  when  the  career  began,  and  before 
tin-  fame  was  made." 

Here  Lady  Ellinor  opened  the  window  which  admitted  on 
tlie  lawn,  and  in  a  few  moments  we  were  in  that  part  of  the 
pleasure-grounds  which  the  family  reserved  from  the  public 
curiosity.  We  passed  by  rare  shrubs  and  strange  flowers, 
lung  ranges  of  conservatories,  in  which  bloomed  and  lived  all 
the  marvellous  vegetation  of  Africa  and  the  Indies. 

k-  Mr.  Trevanion  is  fond  of  flowers?"  said  I. 

The  fair  Fanny  laughed.  I  don't  think  he  knows  one  from 
another." 

k-  Nor  I  either,"  said  T:  "that  is,  when  I  fairly  lose  sight  of 
:i  rose  <>)•  a  hollyhock." 

"The  farm  will  interest  you  more,"  said  Lady  Ellinor. 

We  came,  i<>  farm  buildings  recently  erected,  and  no  doubt 
on  the  most  improved  principle.  Lady  Ellinor  pointed  out  to 
mi'  machines  and  contrivances  of  the  newest  fashion,  for  abridg- 
ing Labour,  and  perfecting  the  mechanical  operations  of  agri- 
culture. 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  115 

"Ah,  then,  Mr.  Trevanion  is  fond  of  farming?" 

The  pretty  Fanny  laughed  again. 

"  My  father  is  one  of  the  great  oracles  in  agriculture,  one 
of  the  great  patrons  of  all  its  improvements  ;  but  as  for  being 
fond  of  farming,  I  doubt  if  he  knows  his  own  fields  when  he 
rides  through  them." 

We  returned  to  the  house ;  and  Miss  Treranion,  whose  frank 
kindness  had  already  made  too  deep  an  impression  upon  the 
youthful  heart  of  Pisistratus  the  Second,  offered  to  show  me 
the  picture-gallery.  The  collection  was  confined  to  the  works 
of  English  artists ;  and  Miss  Trevanion  pointed  out  to  me  the 
main  attractions  of  the  gallery. 

"  Well,  at  least  Mr.  Trevanion  is  fond  of  pictures  ?" 

"Wrong  again,"  said  Fanny,  shaking  her  arch  head.  "My 
father  is  said  to  be  an  admirable  judge ;  but  he  only  buys  pic- 
tures from  a  sense  of  duty — to  encourage  our  own  painters. 
A  picture  once  bought,  I  am  not  sure  that  he  ever  looks  at  it 
again." 

"  What  does  he  then — "  I  stopped  short,  for  I  felt  my  med- 
itated question  was  ill-bred. 

"  What  does  he  like  then  ?  you  were  about  to  say.  Why, 
I  have  known  him,  of  course,  since  I  could  know  anything ; 
but  I  have  never  yet  discovered  what  my  father  does  like. 
Xo — not  even  politics,  though  he  lives  for  politics  alone.  You 
look  puzzled ;  you  will  know  him  better  some  day,  I  hope ; 
but  you  will  never  solve  the  mystery — what  Mr.  Trevanion 
likes!" 

"  You  are  wrong,"  said  Lady  Ellinor,  who  had  followed  us 
into  the  room,  unheard  by  us.  "  I  can  tell  you  what  your 
father  does  more  than  like — what  he  loves  and  serves  every 
hour  of  his  noble  life — justice,  beneficence,  honour,  and  his 
country.  A  man  who  loves  these  may  be  excused  for  indif- 
ference to  the  last  geranium,  or  the  newest  plough,  or  even 
(though  that  offends  you  more,  Fanny)  the  freshest  master- 
piece by  Landseer,  or  the  latest  fashion  honoured  by  Miss 
Trevanion." 

"  Mamma !"  said  Fanny,  and  the  tears  sprang  to  her  eyes. 

But  Lady  Ellinor  looked  to  me  sublime  as  she  spoke,  her 
eyes  kindled,  her  breast  heaved.  The  wife  taking  the  hus- 
band's part  against  the  child,  and  comprehending  so  well  what 
the  child  felt  not,  despite  its  experience  of  every  day,  and 


]  10  l Hi-   C  LXTONB  : 

what  the  world  would  never  know,  despite  all  the  vigilance 
of  its  praise  :ui<l  its  blame,  was  a  picture,  to  my  taste,  finer 
than  any  in  the  collection. 

Her  t;ur  softened  as  she  saw  the  tears  in  Fanny's  bright 
hazel  c\  es  ;  she  held  out  her  hand,  which  her  child  kissed  ten- 
derly: and  whispering,  uTis  not  the  giddy  word  you  must 
go  by,  mamma,  or  there  will  be  something  to  forgive  every 
minute,"  3Jiss  Trevanion  glided  from  the  room. 

tw  Have  you  a  sister  ?"  asked  Lady  Ellinor. 

"No." 

"And  Trevanion  has  no  son,"  she  said,  mournfully.  The 
blood  rushed  to  my  cheeks.  Oh!  young  fool,  again!  We 
were  both  silent,  when  the  door  was  opened,  and  Mr.  Trevan- 
ion entered. 

"  Humph !"  said  he,  smiling  as  he  saw  me — and  his  smile 
was  charming  though  rare.  "Humph,  young  sir,  I  came  to 
seek  for  you, — I  have  been  rude,  I  fear:  pardon  it — that 
thought  has  only  just  occurred  to  me,  so  I  left  my  Blue  Books, 
and  my  amanuensis  hard  at  work  on  them,  to  ask  you  to  come 
out  for  half  an  hour, — -just  half  an  hour,  it  is  all  I  can  give 
you — a  deputation  at  One!  You  dine  and  sleep  here,  of 
course?" 

"  Ah,  sir !  my  mother  will  be  so  uneasy  if  I  am  not  in  town 
to-night." 

"  Pooh !"  said  the  member,  "  I'll  send  an  express." 

"  Oh,  no  indeed :  thank  you." 

"Why  not?" 

I  hesitated.  "  You  see,  sir,  that  my  father  and  mother  are 
both  new  to  London  :  and  though  I  am  new  too,  yet  they  may 
want  mi — I  may  be  of  use."  Lady  Ellinor  put  her  hand  on 
my  head,  and  sleeked  down  my  hair  as  I  spoke. 

"  Right,  young  man,  right;  you  will  do  in  the  world,  wrong- 
as  that  is.  I  don't  mean  thai  you'll  succeed,  as  the  rogues  say 
— that's  another  question  ;  but  if  you  don't  rise,  you'll  not  fall. 
Now,  put  on  your  hat  and  come  with  me;  we'll  walk  to  the 
Lodg< — you  will  be  in  time  for  a  coach." 

I  took  my  leave  of  Lady  Ellinor,  and  longed  to  say  Bome- 
thing  about  "compliments  to  Mi^s  Fanny;"  but  the  words 
stuck  in  my  throat,  and  my  h<^i  Beemed  impatient. 

w-  We  imi-1  sec  you  soon  again!"  said  Lady  Ellinor,  kindly, 
a-  she  followed  us  to  the  door. 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  117 

Mi*.  Trevanion  walked  on  briskly  and  in  silence — one  hand 
in  his  bosom,  the  other  swinging  carelessly  a  thick  walking- 
stick. 

"But  I  must  go  round  by  the  bridge,"  said  I,  "for  I  forgot 
my  knapsack.  I  threw  it  off  when  I  made  my  leap,  and  the 
old  lady  certainly  never  took  charge  of  it." 

"  Come,  then,  this  way.     How  old  are  you  ?" 

"  Seventeen  and  a  half." 

"  You  know  Lathi  and  Greek  as  they  know  them  at  schools, 
I  suppose  ?" 

"  I  think  I  know  them  pretty  well,  sir." 

"  Does  your  father  say  so  ?" 

"  Why,  my  father  is  fastidious ;  however,  he  owns  that  he 
is  satisfied,  on  the  whole." 

"  So  am  I,  then.     Mathematics  ?" 

"A  little." 

«  Good." 

Here  the  conversation  dropped  for  some  time.  I  had  found 
and  restrapped  the  knapsack,  and  we  were  near  the  lodge, 
when  Mr.  Trevanion  said,  abruptly,  "  Talk,  my  young  friend, 
talk:  I  like  to  hear  you  talk — it  refreshes  me.  Nobody  has 
talked  naturally  to  me  these  last  ten  years." 

The  request  was  a  complete  damper  to  my  ingenuous  elo- 
quence :  I  could  not  have  talked  naturally  now  for  the  life 
of  me. 

"I  made  a  mistake,  I  see,"  said  my  companion,  good-hu- 
mouredly,  noticing  my  embarrassment.  "  Here  Ave  are  at  the 
lodge.  The  coach  will  be  by  in  five  minutes ;  you  can  spend 
that  time  in  hearing  the  old  woman  praise  the  Hogtons  and 
abuse  me.  And  hark  you,  sir,  never  care  three  straws  for 
praise  or  blame — leather  and  prunella !  praise  and  blame  are 
here!"  and  he  struck  his  hand  upon  his  breast  with  almost 
passionate  emphasis.  "Take  a  specimen.  These  Hogtons 
were  the  bane  of  the  place ;  uneducated  and  miserly ;  their 
land  a  wilderness,  their  village  a  pig-sty.  I  come,  with  capital 
and  intelligence ;  I  redeem  the  soil,  I  banish  pauperism,  I  civ- 
ilize all  around  me ;  no  merit  in  me — I  am  but  a  type  of  capital 
guided  by  education — a  machine.  And  yet  the  old  woman  is 
not  the  only  one  who  will  hint  to  you  that  the  Hogtons  were 
angels,  and  myself  the  usual  antithesis  to  angels.  And,  what 
is  more,  sir,  because  that  old  woman,  who  has  ten  shillings 


1  I  B  ill  i :  <  ax  TONS  : 

a-week  from  me,  Beta  her  hearl  upon  earning  her  sixpences — 
and  I  give  her  that  privileged  luxury — every  visitor  she  talks 
to  goes  away  with  the  idea  that  I,  the  rich  Mr.  Trevanion,  let 
her  starve  on  what  she  can  pick  up  from  the  Bight-seers.  Now, 
does  that  signify  a  jot?  Good-by.  Tell  your  father  his  old 
friend  must  see  him;  profit  by  his  calm  wisdom;  his  old  friend 
i-  a  fool  sometimes,  and  sad  at  heart.  When  you  are  settled, 
send  me  a  line  to  St.  James's  Square,  to  say  where  you  are. 
Humph !  that's  enough." 

Mr.  Trevanion  wrung  my  hand,  and  strode  off. 

I  did  not  wait  for  the  coach,  but  proceeded  towards  the 
turn-stile  where  the  old  woman  (who  had  either  seen,  or 
scented  from  a  distance,  that  tizzy  of  which  I  wTas  the  imper- 
sonation)— 

"  Hushed  in  grim  repose,  did  wait  her  morning  prey." 

My  opinions  as  to  her  sufferings,  and  the  virtues  of  the  de- 
parted Ilogtons,  somewhat  modified,  I  contented  myself  with 
dropping  into  her  open  palm  the  exact  sum  virtually  agreed  on. 
But  that  palm  still  remained  open,  and  the  fingers  of  the  other 
elawed  hold  of  me  as  I  stood,  impounded  in  the  curve  of  the 
turn-stile,  like  a  cork  in  a  patent  corkscrew. 

"  And  threepence  for  Nephy  Bob,"  said  the  old  lady. 

"  Threepence  for  nephew  Bob,  and  why  ?" 

a'Tis  his  parquisites  when  he  recommends  a  gentleman. 
You  would  not  have  me  pay  out  of  my  own  earnings ;  for  he 
will  have  it,  or  he'll  ruin  my  bizziness.  Poor  folk  must  be 
paid  for  their  trouble." 

Obdurate  to  this  appeal,  and  mentally  consigning  Bob  to  a 
master  whose  feet  would  be  all  the  handsomer  for  boots,  I 
threaded  the  stile  and  escaped.   • 

Towards  evening  I  reached  London.  Who  ever  saw  Lon- 
don for  the  first  time  and  was  not  disappointed?  Those  long 
suburbs  melting  indefinably  away  into  the  capital,  forbid  all 
surprise.  The  gradual  is  a  great  disenchanter.  I  thought  it 
prudenl  to  take  a  hackney-coach,  and  so  jolted  my  way  to  the 

Hotel,  the  door  of  which  was  in  a  small  street  out  of  1  lie 

Strand,  though  the  greater  part  of  the  building  faced  that 
noisy  thoroughfare.  I  found  my  lather  in  a  state  of  great  dis- 
comfort in  a  little  room,  which  he  paced  up  and  down  like  a 
lion  new  caught  in  hi-  cage.  M\  poor  mother  was  lull  of 
complaints — lor  the  first  time  in  her  life,  I   found  her  indispu- 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  119 

tably  crossish.  It  was  an  ill  time  to  relate  my  adventures.  I 
had  enough  to  do  to  listen.  They  had  all  day  been  hunting 
for  lodgings  in  vain.  My  father's  pocket  had  been  picked  of  a 
new  India  handkerchief.  Primmins,  who  ought  to  know  Lon- 
don so  well,  knew  nothing  about  it,  and  declared  it  was  turned 
topsy-turvy,  and  all  the  streets  had  changed  names.  The  new 
silk  umbrella,  left  for  five  minutes  unguarded  in  the  hall,  had 
been  exchanged  for  an  old  gingham  with  three  holes  in  it. 

It  was  not  till  my  mother  remembered  that  if  she  did  not 
see  herself  that  my  bed  was  well  aired  I  should  certainly  lose 
the  use  of  my  limbs,  and  therefore  disappeared  with  Primmins 
and  a  pert  chambermaid,  who  seemed  to  think  we  gave  more 
trouble  than  we  were  worth,  that  I  told  my  father  of  nrynew 
acquaintance  with  Mr.  Trevanion. 

He  did  not  seem  to  listen  to  me  till  I  got  to  the  name  Tre- 
vanion. He  then  became  very  pale,  and  sat  down  quietly. 
"  Go  on,"  said  he,  observing  I  stopped  to  look  at  him. 

When  I  had  told  all,  and  given  him  the  kind  messages  with 
which  I  had  been  charged  by  husband  and  wife,  he  smiled 
faintly :  and  then,  shading  his  face  with  his  hand,  he  seemed 
to  muse,  not  cheerfully,  perhaps,  for  I  heard  him  sigh  once  or 
twice. 

"  And  Ellinor,"  said  he  at  last,  without  looking  up — "  Lady 
Ellinor,  I  mean :  she  is  very — very — " 

"Very  what,  sir?" 

"  Very  handsome  still  ?" 

"Handsome!  Yes,  handsome,  certainly;  but  I  thought 
more  of  her  manner  than  her  face.  And  then  Fanny,  Miss 
Fanny,  is  so  young !" 

"  Ah  I"  said  my  father,  murmuring  in  Greek  the  celebrated 
lines  of  which  Pope's  translation  is  familiar  to  all : 

"  'Like  leaves  on  trees  the  race  of  man  is  found, 

Now  green  in  youth,  now  withering  on  the  ground.' 

Well,  so  they  wish  to  see  me.  Did  Ellinor,  Lady  Ellinor,  say 
that,  or  her — her  husband  ?" 

"  Her  husband,  certainly — Lady  Ellinor  rather  implied  than 
said  it." 

"  We  shall  see,"  said  my  father.  "  Open  the  window ;  this 
room  is  stifling." 

I  opened  the  window,  which  looked  on  the  Strand.  The 
noise,  the  voices,  the  trampling  feet,  the  rolling  wheels,  became 


1  26  THE    CAXTONS  : 

Loudly  audible,  My  father  leant  out  for  some  moments,  and  I 
Btood  by  hia  Bide.  He  turned  to  me  with  a  serene  face.  "  Ev- 
ery ant  "ii  the  hill,"  said  he,  "carries  its  load,  and  its  home  is 
but  made  by  the  burden  that  it  bears.  How  happy  am  I! — 
how  I  should  bless  God!  IIow  light  my  burden! — how  secure 
my  home !" 

My  mother  came  in  as  he  ceased.  He  went  up  to  her,  put 
his  arm  round  her  waist,  and  kissed  her. 

Such  caresses  with  him  had  not  lost  their  tender  charm  by 
custom:  my  mother's  brow,  before  somewhat  ruffled,  grew 
smooth  on  the  instant.  Yet  she  lifted  her  eyes  to  his  in  soft 
surprise.  "  I  was  but  thinking,"  said  my  rather,  apologetically, 
"  how  much  I  owed  you,  and  how  much  I  love  you!" 


CHAPTER  II. 

And  now  behold  us,  three  days  after  my  arrival,  settled  in 
all  the  state  and  grandeur  of* our  own  house  in  Russell  Street, 
Bloomsbury :  the  library  of  the  Museum  close  at  hand.  My 
father  spends  his  mornings  in  those  lata  silentia,  as  Virgil 
calls  the  world  beyond  the  grave.  And  a  world  beyond  the 
grave  we  may  well  call  that  land  of  the  ghosts,  a  book  collec- 
tion. 

"  Pisistratus,"  said  my  father,  one  evening,  as  he  arranged 
his  notes  before  him,  and  rubbed  his  spectacles.  "  Pisistratus, 
a  great  library  is  an  awful  place  !  There  are  interred  all  the 
remains  of  men  since  the  Flood." 

"  It  is  a  burial-place !"  quoth  my  Uncle  Roland,  who  had 
that  day  found  us  out. 

"It  is  an  Heraclea!"  said  my  father. 

"Please,  not  such  hard  words,"  said  the  Captain,  shaking 
bis  head. 

"  Heraclea  was  the  city  of  necromancers,  in  which  they  raised 
the  dead.  I><»  I  want  to  speak  to  Cicero? — I  invoke  him.  Do 
I  want  to  chat  in  the  Athenian  market-place,  and  hear  news 
two  thousand  years  old? — T  write  down  my  charm  on  a  slip 
of  paper,  and  a  grave  magician  calls  me  up  Aristophanes.  And 
u e  owe  all  this  to  our  ancest — " 

"Brother!" 

"  Ancestors,  who  wrote  books— thank  you." 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  121 

Here  Roland  offered  his  snuff-box  to  my  father,  who,  ab- 
horring snuff,  benignly  imbibed  a  pinch,  and  sneezed  five  times 
in  consequence :  an  excuse  for  Uncle  Roland  to  say,  which  he 
did  five  times,  with  great  unction,  "  God  bless  you,  brother 
Austin !" 

As  soon  as  my  father  had  recovered  himself,  he  proceeded, 
with  tears  in  his  eyes,  but  calm  as  before  the  interruption — for 
he  was  of  the  philosophy  of  the  Stoics : 

"  But  it  is  not  that  which  is  awful.  It  is  the  presuming  to 
vie  with  these  '  spirits  elect :'  to  say  to  them,  c  Make  way — I 
too  claim  jriace  with  the  chosen.  I  too  would  confer  with  the 
living,  centuries  after  the  death  that  consmnes  my  dust.  I  too' 
— Ah,  Pisistratus !  I  wish  Uncle  Jack  had  been  at  Jericho  be- 
fore he  had  brought  me  up  to  London,  and  placed  me  in  the 
midst  of  those  rulers  of  the  world  !" 

I  was  busy,  while  my  father  spoke,  in  making  some  pendent 
shelves  for  these  "  spirits  elect :"  for  my  mother,  always  provi- 
dent where  my  father's  comforts  were  concerned,  had  foreseen 
the  necessity  of  some  such  accommodation  in  a  hired  lodging- 
house,  and  had  not  only  carefully  brought  up  to  town  my  little 
box  of  tools,  but  gone  out  herself  that  morning  to  buy  the  raw 
materials.  Checking  the  plane  in  its  progress  over  the  smooth 
deal,  "  My  dear  father,"  said  I,  "  if  at  the  Philhellenic  Institute 
I  had  looked  with  as  much  awe  as  you  on  the  big  fellows  that 
had  gone  before  me,  I  should  have  stayed,  to  all  eternity,  the 
lag  of  the  Infant  Division." 

"Pisistratus,  you  are  as  great  an  agitator  as  your  name- 
sake," cried  my  father,  smiling.  "And  so,  a  fig  for  the  big 
fellows !" 

And  now  my  mother  entered  in  her  pretty  evening  cap,  all 
smiles  and  good-humour,  having  just  arranged  a  room  for 
Uncle  Roland,  concluded  advantageous  negotiations  with  the 
laundress,  held  high  council  with  Mrs.  Primmins  on  the  best 
mode  of  defeating  the  extortions  of  London  tradesmen ;  and, 
pleased  with  herself  and  all  the  world,  she  kissed  my  father's 
forehead  as  it  bent  over  his  notes,  and  came  to  the  tea-table, 
which  only  waited  its  presiding  deity.  My  L'ncle  Roland, 
with  his  usual  gallantry,  started  up,  kettle  in  hand  (our  own 
urn — for  we  had  one — not  being  yet  unpacked),  and  having 
performed  with  soldier-like  method  the  chivalrous  office  thus 
volunteered,  he  joined  me  at  my  employment,  and  said — 

F 


122  I  HE   I  a\  rONfl  : 

"There  is  a  better  steel  for  the  hands  of  a  well-born  lad  than 
a  carpenter's  plane." 

'•Alia!   illicit — thai  depends — " 

"  Depends !— What  on?" 

"On  the  use  one  makes  of  it.  Peter  the  Great  was  better 
employed  in  making  ships  than  Charles  XII.  in  cutting 
throats." 

"  Poor  Charles  XII. !"  said  my  nncle,  sighing  pathetically — 
"  a  very  brave  fellow !" 

"  Pity  he  did  not  like  the  ladies  a  little  better !" 

"  No  man  is  perfect !"  said  my  uncle,  sententiously.  "  But, 
seriously,  you  are  now  the  male  hope  of  the  family — you  are 
now — "  My  uncle  stopped,  and  his  face  darkened.  I  saw 
that  he  thought  of  his  son — that  mysterious  son !  And,  look- 
ing at  him  tenderly,  I  observed  that  his  deep  lines  had  grown 
deeper,  his  iron-gray  hair  more  gray.  There  was  the  trace  of 
recent  suffering  on  his  face ;  and  though  he  had  not  spoken  to 
us  a  word  of  the  business  on  which  he  had  left  us,  it  required 
no  penetration  to  perceive  that  it  had  come  to  no  successful 
issue. 

My  uncle  resumed — "  Time  out  of  mind,  every  generation 
of  our  house  has  given  one  soldier  to  his  country.  I  look 
round  now :  only  one  branch  is  budding  yet  on  the  old  tree ; 
and—" 

"  Ah !  uncle.  But  what  would  they  say  ?  Do  you  think  I 
should  not  like  to  be  a  soldier  ?     Don't  tempt  me !" 

My  uncle  had  recourse  to  his  snuff-box  :  and  at  that  moment , 
unfortunately,  perhaps,  for  the  laurels  that  might  otherwise 
have  wreathed  the  brow  of  Pisistratus  of  England, — private 
conversation  was  stopped  by  the  sudden  and  noisy  entrance 
of  Uncle  Jack.  No  apparition  could  have  been  more  unex- 
pected. 

"  Here  I  am,  my  dear  friends.  How  d'ye  do — how  are  you 
all  ?  Captain  dc  Caxton,  yours  heartily.  Yes,  I  am  released, 
thank  heaven !  I  have  given  up  the  drudgery  of  that  pitiful 
provincial  paper.  I  was  not  made  for  it.  An  ocean  in  a  lea- 
cup!  I  was  indeed!  Little,  sordid,  narrow  interests — and  I, 
whose  heart  embraces  all  humanity.  You  might  as  well  turn 
a  circle  into  an  isolated  triangle." 

"Isosceles  I"  said  my  father,  sighing  as  he  pushed  aside  his 
notes,  and  very  slowly  becoming  aware  of  the  eloquence  that 


A    FAMILY    PICTUBE.  123 

destroyed  all  chance  of  further  progress  that  night  in  the  Great 
Book.     "  Isosceles  triangle,  Jack  Tibbets — not  isolated." 

"  Isosceles  or  isolated,  it  is  all  one,"  said  Uncle  Jack,  as  he 
rapidly  performed  three  evolutions,  by  no  means  consistent  with 
his  favourite  theory  of  "the  greatest  happiness  of  the  greatest 
number  :" — first,  he  emptied  into  the  cup  which  he  took  from 
my  mother's  hands  half  the  thrifty  contents  of  a  London  cream- 
jug  ;  secondly,  he  reduced  the  circle  of  a  muffin,  by  the  abstrac- 
tion of  three  triangles,  to  as  nearly  an  isosceles  as  possible ;  and 
thirdly,  striding  towards  the  fire,  lighted  in  consideration  of 
Captain  de  Caxton,  and  hooking  his  coat-tails  under  his  arms, 
Avhile  he  sipped  his  tea,  he  permitted  another  circle  peculiar  to 
humanity  wholly  to  eclipse  the  luminary  it  approached. 

"  Isolated  or  isosceles,  it  is  all  the  same  thing.  Man  is  made 
for  his  fellow-creatures.  I  had  long  been  disgusted  with  the 
interference  of  those  selfish  Squirearchs.  Your  departure  de- 
cided me.  I  have  concluded  negotiations  with  a  London  firm 
of  spirit  and  capital,  and  extended  views  of  philanthropy.  On 
Saturday  last  I  retired  from  the  service  of  the  oligarchy.  I  am 
now  in  my  true  capacity  of  protector  of  the  million.  My  pro- 
spectus is  printed — here  it  is  in  my  pocket. — Another  cup  of 
tea,  sister  ;  a  little  more  cream,  and  another  muffin.  Shall  I 
ring  ?"  Having  disembarrassed  himself  of  his  cup  and  saucer, 
Uncle  Jack  then  drew  forth  from  his  pocket  a  damp  sheet  of 
printed  paper.  In  large  capitals  stood  out  "The  Axti-Moxop- 
oly  Gazette,  or  Popular  Champiox."  He  waved  it  triumph- 
antly before  my  father's  eyes. 

"  Pisistratus,"  said  my  father,  "  look  here.  This  is  the  way 
your  Uncle  Jack  now  prints  his  pats  of  butter :  a  cap  of  lib- 
erty growing  out  of  an  open  book  !  Good,  Jack  !  Good  ! 
good !" 

"  It  is  Jacobinical !"  exclaimed  the  Captain. 

"  Very  likely,"  said  my  father  ;  "but  knowledge  and  freedom 
are  the  best  devices  in  the  world  to  print  upon  pats  of  butter 
intended  for  the  market." 

"Pats  of  butter  !  I  don't  understand,"  said  Uncle  Jack. 

"  The  less  you  understand,  the  better  will  the  butter  sell, 
Jack,"  said  my  father,  settling  back  to  his  notes. 


L  24  rHE  c axtons  : 


CHAPTER  III. 

Uncle  Jack  had  made  up  his  mind  to  lodge  with  as,  and  my 

mot  her  found  some  difficulty  in  inducing  him  to  comprehend 
thai  there  was  no  bed  to  spare. 

"That's  unlucky,"  said  he.  "I  had  no  sooner  arrived  in 
town  than  I  was  pestered  with  invitations;  but  I  refused  them 
all,  and  kept  myself  for  you." 

"  So  kind  in  you !  so  like  you  !"  said  my  mother ;  "  but  vou 
see—" 

"  Well, then,  I  must  be  off  and  find  a  room.  Don't  fret ;  you 
know  I  can  breakfast  and  dine  with  you  all  the  same  ;  that  is, 
when  my  other  friends  will  let  me.  I  shall  be  dreadfully  per- 
secuted." So  saying,  Uncle  Jack  repocketed  his  prospectus, 
and  wished  us  good-night. 

The  clock  had  struck  eleven,  my  mother  had  retired,  when 
my  father  looked  up  from  his  books,  and  returned  his  specta- 
cles to  their  case.  I  had  finished  my  work,  and  was  seated 
over  the  fire,  thinking  now  of  Fanny  Trevanion's  hazel  eyes — 
now,  with  a  heart  that  beat  as  high  at  the  thought  of  cam- 
paigns, battle-fields,  laurels,  and  glory;  while,  with  his  arms 
folded  on  his  breast  and  his  head  drooping,  Uncle  Roland 
gazed  into  the  low  clear  embers.  My  father  cast  his  eyes 
round  the  room,  and  after  surveying  his  brother  for  a  few  mo- 
ments, he  said,  almost  in  a  whisper — 

"  My  son  has  seen  the  Trevanions.  They  remember  us,  Ro- 
land." 

The  Captain  sprang  to  his  feet,  and  began  whistling — a  habit 
with  him  when  he  was  much  disturbed. 

"And  Trevanion  wishes  to  see  us.  Pisistratus  promised  to 
give  him  our  address  ;  shall  he  do  so,  Roland  V" 

"If  you  like  it,"  answered  the  Captain,  in  a  military  attitude, 
and  drawing  himself  up  till  he  looked  seven  feet  high. 

"I  sJiould  like  it,"  said  my  father,  mildly.  "Twenty  years 
since  we  met." 

"More  than  twenty,"  said  my  uncle,  with  a  stern  smile; 
'•and  the  season  was— the  fall  of  the  leaf!" 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  125 

"  Man  renews  the  fibre  and  material  of  his  body  every  seven 
years,"  said  my  father ;  "  in  three  times  seven  years  he  has 
time  to  renew  the  inner  man.  Can  two  passengers  in  yonder 
street  be  more  unlike  each  other  than  the  sonl  is  to  the  sonl 
after  an  interval  of  twenty  years  ?  Brother,  the  plough  does 
not  pass  over  the  soil  in  vain,  nor  care  over  the  human  heart. 
New  crops  change  the  character  of  the  land  ;  and  the  plough 
must  go  deep  indeed  before  it  stirs  up  the  mother  stone." 

"  Let  us  see  Trevanion,"  cried  my  uncle ;  then,  turning  to 
me,  he  said,  abruptly,  "  What  family  has  he  ?" 

"  One  daughter." 

"No  son?" 

"  No." 

"  That  must  vex  the  poor  foolish  ambitious  man.  Oho  !  you 
admire  this  Mr.  Trevanion  much,  eh  ?  Yes,  that  fire  of  manner, 
his  fine  words,  and  bold  thoughts,  were  made  to  dazzle  youth." 

"  Fine  words,  my  dear  uncle ! — fire !  I  should  have  said,  in 
hearing  Mr.  Trevanion,  that  his  style  of  conversation  was  so 
homely,  you  would  wonder  how  he  could  have  won  such  fame 
as  a  public  speaker." 

"Indeed!" 

"  The  plough  has  passed  there,"  said  my  father. 

"  But  not  the  plough  of  care :  rich,  famous,  Ellinor  his  wife, 
and  no  son." 

"  It  is  because  his  heart  is  sometimes  sad  that  he  would  see 
us." 

Roland  stared  first  at  my  father,  next  at  me.  "  Then,"  quoth 
my  uncle,  heartily,  "  in  God's  name,  let  him  come.  I  can  shake 
him  by  the  hand,  as  I  would  a  brother  soldier.  Poor  Trevan- 
ion !     Write  to  him  at  once,  Sisty." 

I  sat  down  and  obeyed.  When  I  had  sealed  my  letter,  I 
looked  up,  and  saw  that  Roland  was  lighting  his  bed-candle  at 
ray  father's  table ;  and  my  father,  taking  his  hand,  said  some- 
thing to  him  in  a  low  voice.  I  guessed  it  related  to  his  son, 
for  he  shook  his  head,  and  answered  in  a  stern,  hollow  voice, 
"Renew  grief  if  you  please — not  shame.  On  that  subject — 
silence !" 


L26  i  m;   CAXTONS 


CHAPTER  IV. 

Left  to  myself  in  the  earlier  part  of  the  day,  I  wandered, 
ti  istful  and  lonely,  through  the  vast  wilderness  of  London,  i  Sy 
degrees,  I  familiarized  myself  with  that  populous  solitude — I 
.rased  to  pine  for  the  green  fields.  The  active  energy  all 
around,  at  first  saddening,  became  soon  exhilarating,  and  at  last 
contagious.  To  an  industrious  mind,  nothing  is  so  catching  as 
industry.  I  began  to  grow  weary  of  my  golden  holiday  of  un- 
laborious  childhood,  to  sigh  for  toil,  to  look  around  me  for  a 
career.  The  University,  which  I  had  before  anticipated  with 
pleasure,  seemed  now  to  fade  into  a  dull  monastic  prospect : 
after  having  trode  the  streets  of  London,  to  wander  through 
cloisters  was  to  go  back  in  life.  Day  by  day,  my  mind  grew 
sensibly  within  me ;  it  came  out  from  the  rosy  twilight  of 
boyhood — it  felt  the  doom  of  Cain,  under  the  broad  sun  of 
man. 

Uncle  Jack  soon  became  absorbed  in  his  new  speculation  for 
the  good  of  the  human  race,  and,  except  at  meals  (whereat,  to 
do  him  justice,  he  was  punctual  enough,  though  he  did  not  keep 
u-  in  ignorance  of  the  sacrifices  he  made,  and  the  invitations  he 
refused,  for  our  sake),  we  seldom  saw  him.  The  Captain,  too, 
generally  vanished  after  breakfast,  seldom  dined  with  us,  and 
it  was  often  late  before  he  returned.  He  had  the  latch-key  of 
the  house,  and  let  himself  in  when  he  pleased.  Sometimes  (for 
his  chamber  was  next  to  mine)  his  step  on  the  stairs  awoke  me ; 
and  Bometimes  I  heard  him  pace  his  room  with  perturbed 
-i  rides,  or  fancied  that  I  caught  a  low  groan.  He  became  ev- 
ery day  more  care-worn  in  appearance,  and  every  day  the  hair 
seemed  more  gray.  Yet  he  talked  to  us  all  easily  and  cheer- 
fully ;  and  I  thought  that  I  was  the  only  one  in  the  house  who 
perceived  the  gnawing  pangs  over  which  the  stout  old  Spartan 
drew  the  decorous  cloak. 

Pity,  blended  with  admiration,  made  me  curious  to  learn 
how  these  absenl  days,  that  broughl  nights  so  disturbed,  were 
consumed.  I  felt  that,  if  I  could  master  the  Captain's  secret,  I 
mighl  win  1  lie  right  both  to  comfort  and  to  aid. 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  127 

I  resolved  at  length,  after  many  conscientious  scruples,  to 
endeavour  to  satisfy  a  curiosity  excused  by  its  motives. 

Accordingly,  one  morning,  after  watching  him  from  the 
house,  I  stole  in  his  track,  and  followed  him  at  a  distance. 

And  this  was  the  outline  of  his  day  :  he  set  off  at  first  with 
a  firm  stride,  despite  his  lameness — his  gaunt  figure  erect,  the 
soldierly  chest  well  thrown  out  from  the  threadbare  but  speck- 
less  coat.  First,  he  took  his  way  amid  the  purlieus  of  Leices- 
ter Square  ;  several  times,  to  and  fro,  did  he  pace  the  isthmus 
that  leads  from  Piccadilly  into  that  reservoir  of  foreigners,  and 
the  lanes  and  courts  that  start  thence  towards  St.  Martin's. 
After  an  hour  or  two  so  passed,  the  step  became  more  slow ; 
and  often  the  sleek,  napless  hat  was  lifted  up,  and  the  brow 
wiped.  At  length  he  bent  his  way  towards  the  two  great 
theatres,  paused  before  the  play-bills,  as  if  deliberating  serious- 
ly on  the  chances  of  entertainment  they  severally  proffered, 
wandered  slowly  through  the  "small  streets  that  surround  those 
temples  of  the  Muse,  and  finally  emerged  into  the  Strand. 
There  he  rested  for  an  hour,  at  a  small  cook-shop ;  and,  as  I 
passed  the  window  and  glanced  within,  I  could  see  him  seated 
before  the  simple  dinner,  which  he  scarcely  touched,  and  por- 
ing over  the  advertisement  columns  of  the  Times.  The  Times 
finished,  and  a  few  morsels  distastefully  swallowed,  the  Captain 
put  down  his  shilling  in  silence,  receiving  his  pence  in  exchange, 
and  I  had  just  time  to  slip  aside  as  he  reappeared  at  the  thresh- 
old. He  looked  round  as  he  lingered,  but  I  took  care  he  should 
not  detect  me;  and  then  struck  off  towards  the  more  fashion- 
able quarters  of  the  town.  It  was  now  the  afternoon,  and, 
though  not  yet  the  season,  the  streets  swarmed  with  life.  As 
he  came  into  Waterloo  Place,  a  slight  but  muscular  figure,  but- 
toned up  across  the  breast  like  his  own,  cantered  by  on  a  hand- 
some bay  horse  :  every  eye  was  on  that  figure.  Uncle  Poland 
stopped  short,  and  lifted  his  hand  to  his  hat ;  the  rider  touched 
his  own  with  his  forefinger,  and  cantered  on — Uncle  Roland 
turned  round  and  gazed. 

"  Who,"  I  asked,  of  a  shop-boy  just  before  me,  also  staring 
with  all  his  eyes — "who  is  that  gentleman  on  horseback?" 

"  Why,  the  Duke,  to  be  sure,"  said  the  boy,  contemptuously. 

"  The  Duke  ?" 

"  Wellington— stu-pid !" 

"  Thank  you,"  said  I,  meekly.     Uncle  Roland  had  moved  on 


128  i  mi.   <   LXT0N8  : 

into  Regent  Street, "but  with  a  brisker  step:  the  sight  of  the 
old  chief  had  done  the  old  soldier  good.  Here  again  he  paced 
bo  and  fro;  till  I,  watching  li'mi  from  the  other  side  of  the  way, 
was  ready  to  drop  with  fatigue,  stout  walker  though  I  was. 
But  the  Captain's  day  was  not  half  done.  He  took  out  his 
watch,  put  it  to  his  ear,  and  then,  replacing  it,  passed  into 
Bond  Street,  and  thence  into  Hyde  Park.  There,  evidently 
wearied  out,  lie  leant  against  the  rails,  near  the  bronze  statue, 
in  an  attitude  that  spoke  despondency.  I  seated  myself  on 
the  grass  near  the  statue,  and  gazed,  at  him;  the  park  was 
empty  compared  with  the  streets,  but  still  there  were  some 
equestrian  idlers,  and  many  foot-loungers.  My  uncle's  eye 
turned  wistfully  on  each :  once  or  twice,  some  gentleman  of  a 
military  aspect  (which  I  had  already  learned  to  detect)  stop- 
ped, looked  at  him,  approached,  and  spoke;  but  the  Captain 
seemed  as  if  ashamed  of  such  greetings.  He  answered  short- 
ly, and  turned  again. 

The  day  waned — evening  came  on :  the  Captain  again  look- 
ed at  his  watch,  shook  his  head,  and  made  his  way  to  a  bench, 
where  he  sat  perfectly  motionless — his  hat  over  his  brows,  his 
arms  folded ;  till  uprose  the  moon.  I  had  tasted  nothing  since 
breakfast — I  was  famished;  but  I  still  kept  my  j>ost  like  an 
old  Roman  sentinel. 

At  length  the  Captain  rose,  and  re-entered  Piccadilly;  but 
how  different  his  mien  and  bearing!  languid,  stooping;  his 
chest  sunk,  his  head  inclined;  his  limbs  dragging  one  after  the 
other;  Ins  lameness  painfully  perceptible.  What  a  contrast  in 
the  broken  invalid  at  night  from  the  stalwart  veteran  of  the 
morning ! 

I  low  I  longed  to  spring  forward  to  offer  my  arm!  but  I  did 
not  dare. 

The  Captain  stopped  near  a  cab-stand.  lie  put  his  hand  in 
his  pocket — he  drew  out  his  purse — he  passed  his  fingers  over 
the  network;  the  purse  slipped  again  into  the  pocket,  and,  as 
if  with  a  heroic  effort,  my  uncle  drew  up  his  head,  and  walked 
on  sturdily. 

"  Where  next  ?"  thought  T.  "  Surely  home  !  No,  he  is  pit- 
iless!" 

The  Captain  stopped  not  till  he  arrived  at  one  of  the  small 
theatres  in  the  Strand  ;  then  he  rend  the  bill,  and  asked  if  half- 
price  was  begun.     "Jus1  begun,"  was  the  answer,  and  the 


A    FAMILY    PICTUEE.  129 

Captain  entered.  I  also  took  a  ticket  and  followed.  Passing 
by  the  open  doors  of  a  refreshment-room,  I  fortified  myself 
with  some  biscuits  and  soda-water  ;  and  in  another  minute,  for 
the  first  time  in  my  life,  I  beheld  a  play.  But  the  play  did  not 
fascinate  me.  It  was  the  middle  of  some  jocular  afterpiece; 
roars  of  laughter  resounded  round  me.  I  could  detect  nothing 
to  laugh  at,  and  sending  my  keen  eyes  into  every  corner,  I 
perceived  at  last,  in  the  uppermost  tier,  one  face  as  saturnine 
as  my  own.  Eureka  !  It  was  the  Captain's !  "  Why  should 
he  go  to  a  play  if  he  enjoys  it  so  little !"  thought  I ;  "  better 
have  spent  a  shilling  on  a  cab,  poor  old  fellow !" 

But  soon  came  smart-looking  men,  and  still  smarter-looking 
ladies,  around  the  solitary  corner  of  the  poor  Captain.  He 
grew  fidgety — he  rose — he  vanished.  I  left  my  place,  and 
stood  without  the  box  to  watch  for  him.  Down  stairs  he 
stumped — I  recoiled  into  the  shade  ;  and  after  standing  a  mo- 
ment or  two,  as  in  doubt,  he  entered  boldly  the  refreshment- 
room  or  saloon. 

Now,  since  I  had  left  that  saloon,  it  had  become  crowded, 
and  I  slipped  in  unobserved.  Strange  was  it,  grotesque  yet 
pathetic,  to  mark  the  old  soldier  in  the  midst  of  that  gay 
swarm.  He  towered  above  all  like  a  Homeric  hero,  a  head 
taller  than  the  tallest ;  and  his  appearance  was  so  remarkable, 
that  it  invited  the  instant  attention  of  the  fair.  I,  in  my  sim- 
plicity, thought  it  was  the  natural  tenderness  of  that  amiable 
and  penetrating  sex,  ever  quick  to  detect  trouble  and  anxious 
to  relieve  it,  which  induced  three  ladies,  in  silk  attire — one 
having  a  hat  and  plume,  the  other  two  with  a  profusion  of 
ringlets — to  leave  a  little  knot  of  gentlemen  with  whom  they 
were  conversing,  and  to  plant  themselves  before  my  uncle.  I 
advanced  through  the  press  to  hear  what  passed. 

"You  are  looking  for  some  one,  I'm  sure,"  quoth  one,  famil- 
iarly tapping  his  arm  with  her  fan. 

The  Captain  started.   "  Ma'am,  you  are  not  wrong,"  said  he. 

"  Can  I  do  as  well  ?"  said  one  of  those  compassionate  angels, 
with  heavenly  sweetness. 

"  You  are  very  kind,  I  thank  you ;  no,  no,  ma'am,"  said,  the 
Captain,  with  his  best  bow. 

"  Do  take  a  glass  of  negus,"  said  another,  as  her  friend  gave 
way  to  her.  "You  seem  tired,  and  so  am  I.  Here,  this  way;" 
and  she  took  hold  of  his  arm  to  lead  him  to  the  table.     The 

F2 


180  Tin:  CAXTONS. 

Captaii]  shook  his  head  mournfully;  and  then,  as  if  suddenly 
aware  of  the  nature  of  the  attentions  so  lavished  on  him,  he 
looked  down  upon  these  fair  Armidas  with  a  look  of  such 
mild  reproach,  such  sweet  compassion  —  not  shaking  off  the 
hand,  in  his  chivalrous  devotion  to  the  sex,  which  extended 
even  to  all  its  outcasts — that  each  bold  eye  fell  abashed.  The 
hand  was  timidly  and  involuntarily  withdrawn  from  the  arm, 
and  my  uncle  passed  his  way. 

He  threaded  the  crowd,  passed  out  at  the  further  door,  and  I, 
guessing  his  intention,  was  in  waiting  for  his  steps  in  the  street. 

••  Now  home  at  last,  thank  heaven!"  thought  I.  Mistaken 
still !  My  uncle  went  first  towards  that  popular  haunt  which 
I  have  since  discovered  is  called  "the  Shades;"  but  he  soon 
re-emerged,  and  finally  he  knocked  at  the  door  of  a  private 
house  in  one  of  the  streets  out  of  St.  James's.  It  was  opened 
jealously,  and  closed  as  he  entered,  leaving  me  without.  What 
could  this  house  be?  As  I  stood  and  watched,  some  other 
men  approached, — again  the  low  single  knock, — again  the  jeal- 
ous opening,  and  the  stealthy  entrance. 

A  policeman  passed  and  repassed  me.  "  Don't  be  tempted, 
young  man,"  said  he,  looking  hard  at  me :  "  take  my  advice, 
and  go  home." 

"  What  is  that  house,  then?"  said  I,  with  a  sort  of  shudder 
at  this  ominous  warning. 

"  Oh,  you  know." 

"  Not  I.     I  am  new  to  London." 

"  It  is  a  hell,"  said  the  policeman — satisfied,  by  my  frank 
manner,  that  I  spoke  the  truth. 

"  God  bless  me — a  what  ?  I  could  not  have  heard  you  rightly  ?" 

"  A  hell ;  a  gambling-house  !" 

"  Oh  !"  and  I  moved  on.  Could  Captain  Roland,  the  rigid, 
the  thrifty,  the  penurious,  be  a  gambler?  The  light  broke  on 
me  at  once:  the  unhappy  father  sought  his  son!  I  leant 
againsl  the  post,  and  tried  hard  not  to  sob. 

By-and-byl  heard  the  door  open  :  the  Captain  came  out  and 
took  the  way  homeward.  I  ran  on  before,  and  got  in  first,  to 
the  inexpressible  relief  both  of  father  and  mother,  who  had  not 
seen  nie  since  breakfast,  and  who  were  in  equal  consternation 
at  my  absence.  I  submitted  to  be  scolded  with  a  good  grace. 
l- 1  had  been  sight-seeing,  and  lost  my  way;11  begged  for  some 
BUpper,  and  slunk  to  bed;  and  five  minutes  afterwards  the 
Captain's  jaded  step  came  wearily  np  the  stairs. 


PAET  SIXTH. 


CHAPTER  I. 


"I  dox't  know  that,"  said  my  father. 

What  is  it  my  father  does  not  know  ?  My  father  does  not 
know  that  "  happiness  is  our  being's  end  and  aim." 

And  pertinent  to  what  does  my  father  reply,  by  words  so 
sceptical,  to  an  assertion  so  seldom  disputed  ? 

Reader,  Mr.  Trevanion  has  been  half  an  hour  seated  in  our 
little  drawing-room.  He  has  received  two  cups  of  tea  from 
my  mother's  fair  hand  ;  he  has  made  himself  at  home.  With 
Mr.  Trevanion  has  come  another  old  friend  of  my  father's, 
whom  he  has  not  seen  since  he  left  college — Sir  Sedley  Beau- 
desert. 

Xow,  you  must  understand  that  it  is  a  warm  night,  a  little 
after  nine  o'clock — a  night  between  departing  summer  and  ap- 
proaching autumn.  The  windows  are  open — we  have  a  bal- 
cony, which  my  mother  has  taken  care  to  fill  with  flowers — 
the  air,  though  we  are  in  London,  is  sweet  and  fresh — the 
street  quiet,  except  that  an  occasional  carriage  or  hackney  cab- 
riolet rolls  rapidly  by — a  few  stealthy  passengers  pass  to  and 
fro  noiselessly  on  their  way  homeward.  We  are  on  classic 
ground — near  that  old  and  venerable  Museum,  the  dark  mo- 
nastic pile  which  the  taste  of  the  age  had  spared  then— and  the 
quiet  of  the  temple  seems  to  hallow  the  precincts.  Captain 
Roland  is  seated  by  the  fireplace;  and,  though  there  is  no  fire, 
he  is  shading  his  face  with  a  hand-screen ;  my  father  and  Mr. 
Trevanion  have  drawn  their  chairs  close  to  each  other  in  the 
middle  of  the  room ;  Sir  Sedley  Beaudesert  leans  against  the 
wall  near  the  window,  and  behind  my  mother,  who  looks  pret- 
tier and  more  pleased  than  usual,  since  her  Austin  has  his  old 
friends  about  him ;  and  I,  leaning  my  elbow  on  the  table,  and 
my  chin  upon  my  hand,  am  gazing  with  great  admiration  on 
Sir  Sedley  Beaudesert. 

O  rare  specimen  of  a  race  fast  decaying  ! — specimen  of  the 
true  fine  gentleman,  ere  the  word  dandy  was  known,  and  be- 
fore exquisite  became  a  noun  substantive — let  me  here  pause 


Tir  to: 

escribe  thee!  Sir  Sedley  Beaudesert  was  the  contempo- 
iry  ofTrevanion  and  my  father;  but,  without  affecting  to  be 
voung,  he  still  Beemed  bo.  Dress, tone, look, manner — all  were 
young — yet  :ill  had  a  certain  dignity  which  does  not  belong  to 
youth.  At  the  age  <>i'  five-and-twenty,  he  had  won  what  would 
have  been  fame  to  a  French  marquis  of  the  old  regime,  viz. — 
the  reputation  of  being  "the  most  charming  man  of  his  day" 
— the  most  popular  of  our  sex — the  most  favored,  my  dear 
lady-reader,  by  yours.  It  is  a  mistake,  I  believe,  to  suppose 
that  it  does  not  require  talent  to  become  the  fashion;  at  all 
events,  Sir  Sedley  was  the  fashion,  and  he  had  talent.  He 
had  travelled  much,  he  had  read  much — especially  in  memoirs, 
history,  and  belles-lettres — he  made  verses  with  grace  and  a 
certain  originality  of  easy  wit  and  courtly  sentiment — he  con- 
versed delightfully,  he  was  polished  and  urbane  in  manner — 
he  was  brave  and  honourable  in  conduct;  in  words  he  could 
Hatter — in  deeds  he  was  sincere. 

Sir  Sedley  Beaudesret  had  never  married.  Whatever  his 
years,  he  was  still  young  enough  in  looks  to  be  married  for 
love.  He  was  highborn,  he  was  rich ;  he  was,  as  I  have  said, 
popular ;  yet  on  his  fair  features  there  was  an  expression  of 
melancholy  ;  and  on  that  forehead — pure  from  the  lines  of  am- 
bition, and  free  from  the  weight  of  study — there  was  the 
shadow  of  unmistakable  regret. 

"  I  don't  know  that,"  said  my  father ;  "  I  have  never  yet 
found  in  life  one  man  who  made  happiness  his  end  and  aim. 
One  wants  to  gain  a  fortune,  another  to  spend  it — one  to  get 
a  place,  another  to  build  a  name;  but  they  all  know  very  well 
that  it  is  not  happiness  they  search  for.  No  Utilitarian  was 
ever  actuated  by  self-interest,  poor  man,  when  lie  sat  down  to 
scribble  his  unpopular  crotchets  to  prove  self-interest  universal. 
And  as  to  that  notable  distinction — between  self-interest  vul- 
gar and  self-interest  enlightened — the  more  the  self-interest  is 
enlightened,  the  less  we  are  influenced  by  it.  If  you  tell  the 
young  man  who  has  just  written  a  fine  book  or  made  a  fine 
speech,  that  he  will  not  be  any  happier  if  he  attain  to  the  fame 
•  •I*  .Milton  or  the  power  of  Pitt,  and  that,  for  the  sake  of  his 
own   happiness,  he  had  much   better  cultivate  a  farm,  live   in 

the  country,  and  postpone  to  the  last   the  days  of  dyspepsia 

and  gOUt,  he  will  answer  you  fairly—*  I  am  quite   as   sensible 
of  that   ;is  you  arc.      I  >  1 1 1    I  :nn  110I    thinking  whether  or  not  I 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  133 

shall  be  happy.  I  have  made  up  mind  to  be,  if  I  can,  a  great 
author  or  a  prime  minister.'  So  it  is  with  all  the  active  sons 
of  the  world.  To  push  on  is  the  law  of  nature.  And  you  can 
no  more  say  to  men  and  to  nations  than  to  children — '  Sit  still, 
and  don't  wear  out  your  shoes  !'  " 

"  Then,"  said  Trevanion,  "if  I  tell  you  I  am  not  happy,  your 
only  answer  is,  that  I  obey  an  inevitable  law." 

"  Xo !  I  don't  say  that  it  is  an  inevitable  law  that  man 
should  not  be  happy ;  but  it  is  an  inevitable  law  that  a  man, 
in  spite  of  himself,  should  live  for  something  higher  than  his 
own  happiness.  He  cannot  live  in  himself  or  for  himself,  how- 
ever egotistical  he  may  try  to  be.  Every  desire  he  has  links 
him  with  others.     3Ian  is  not  a  machine — he  is  a  part  of  one." 

"  True,  brother,  he  is  a  soldier,  not  an  army,"  said  Captain 
Roland. 

"Life  is  a  drama,  not  a  monologue,"  pursued  my  father. 
"  Drama  is  derived  from  a  Greek  verb,  signifying  to  do.  Ev- 
ery actor  in  the  drama  has  something  to  do,  which  helps  on 
the  progress  of  the  whole :  that  is  the  object  for  which  the 
author  created  him.  Do  your  part,  and  let  the  Great  Play 
get  on." 

"Ah!"  said  Trevanion,  briskly,  "but  to  do  the  part  is  the 
difficulty !  Every  actor  helps  to  the  catastrophe,  and  yet  must 
do  his  part  without  knowing  how  all  is  to  end.  Shall  he  help 
the  curtain  to  fall  on  a  tragedy  or  a  comedy?  Come,  I  will 
tell  you  the  one  secret  of  my  public  life — that  which  explains 
all  its  failure  (for,  in  spite  of  my  position,  I  have  failed),  and 
its  regrets — I  want  conviction  /" 

"Exactly,"  said  my  father;  "because  to  every  question 
there  are  two  sides,  and  you  look  at  them  both." 

"You  have  said  it,"  answered  Trevanion,  smiling  also. 
"  For  public  life  a  man  should  be  one-sided ;  he  must  act  with 
a  party ;  and  a  party  insists  that  the  shield  is  silver,  when,  if 
it  will  take  the  trouble  to  turn  the  corner,  it  will  see  that  the 
reverse  of  the  shield  is  gold.  Woe  to  the  man  who  makes 
that  discovery  alone,  while  his  party  are  still  swearing  the  shield 
is  silver,  and  that  not  once  in  his  life,  but  every  night !" 

"You  have  said  quite  enough  to  convince  me  that  you 
ought  not  to  belong  to  a  party,  but  not  enough  to  convince 
me  why  you  should  not  be  happy,"  said  my  father. 

"  Do  you  remember,"  said  Sedley  Beaudesert,  "  an  anecdote 


134  THE   CAXTONS: 

of  the  firsi  Duke  of  Portland?  Be  had  a  gallery  in  the  great 
stable  of  his  villa  in  Holland,  where  :i  concert  was  given  once 
a  week,  to  cheer  and  amusi  his  horses!  1  have  no  doubt  the 
horses  thrived  all  the  better  for  it.  What  Trevanion  wants 
is  .1  concert  <»iuv  a  week.  Willi  him  it  is  always  saddle  and 
spur.  Set,  after  all,  who  would  not  envy  him?  If  life  be  a 
drama,  his  name  stands  high  in  the  playbill,  and  is  printed  in 
capitals  on  the  walls." 

'•Envy  me!"  cried  Trevanion — "me! — no,  you  are  the  en- 
viable man — you  who  have  only  one  grief  in  the  world,  and 
thai  so  absurd  a  one,  that  I  will  make  you  blush  by  disclosing 
it.  Hear,  O  sage  Austin ! — O  sturdy  Roland  !  Olivares  was 
haunted  by  a  spectre,  and  Sedley  Beaudesert  by  the  dread  of 
old  age !" 

"  Well,"  said  my  mother,  seriously,  "  I  do  think  it  requires 
a  great  sense  of  religion,  or,  at  all  events,  children  of  one's 
own,  in  whom  one  is  young  again,  to  reconcile  one's  self  to  be- 
coming old." 

"  My  dear  ma'am,"  said  Sir  Sedley,  who  had  slightly  colour- 
ed at  Trevanion's  charge,  but  had  now  recovered  his  easy  self- 
possession,  "  you  have  spoken  so  admirably,  that  you  give  me 
courage  to  confess  my  weakness.  I  do  dread  to  be  old.  All 
the  joys  of  my  life  have  been  the  joys  of  youth.  I  have  had 
so  exquisite  a  pleasure  in  the  mere  sense  of  living,  that  old  age, 
as  it  comes  near,  terrifies  me  by  its  dull  eyes  and  gray  hairs. 
I  have  lived  the  life  of  a  butterfly.  Summer  is  over,  and  I  see 
my  flowers  withering;  and  my  wings  are  chilled  by  the  first 
airs  of  winter.  Yes,  I  envy  Trevanion ;  for,  in  public  life,  no 
man  is  ever  young ;  and,  while  he  can  work,  he  is  never  old." 

"  My  dear  Beaudesert,"  said  my  father,  "  when  St.  Amable, 
patron  saint  of  Riom,  in  Auvergne,  went  to  Borne,  the  sun 
wait e«l  upon  him  as  a  servant,  carried  his  cloak  and  gloves  for 
him  in  the  heat,  and  kept  off  the  rain,  if  the  weather  changed, 
like  an  umbrella.  You  want  to  put  the  sun  to  the  same  use; 
you  are  quite  right;  but  then,  you  see,  you  must  first  be  a 
saint  before  you  can  be  Bure  of  the  sun  :is  a  servant." 

Sir  Sedley  smiled  charmingly;  but  the  smile  changed  to  a 
si'jli  us  he  added,  UI  don't  think  I  should  much  mind  being  a 
saint,  if  the  sun  would  be  my  sentinel  instead  ofmy  courier. 
I  \\:mi  nothing  of  him  but  to  stand  still.  You  see  he  moved 
even  lor  St.  Amable.     -My  dear  madam, you  and  T  understand 


A  FAMILY    PICTUEE.  135 

each  other ;  and  it  is  a  very  hard  thing  to  grow  old,  do  what 
one  will  to  keep  young." 

"  What  say  you,  Roland,  of  these  two  malcontents  ?"  asked 
my  father.  The  captain  turned  uneasily  in  his  chair,  for  the 
rheumatism  was  gnawing  his  shoulder,  and  sharp  pains  were 
shooting;  through  his  mutilated  limb. 

"  I  say,"  answered  Roland,  "  that  these  men  are  wearied 
with  marching  from  Brentford  to  Windsor — that  they  have 
never  known  the  bivouac  and  the  battle." 

Both  the  grumblers  turned  their  eyes  to  the  veteran :  the 
eyes  rested  first  on  the  furrowed,  care-worn  lines  in  his  eagle 
face — then  they  fell  on  the  stiff  outstretched  cork  limb — and 
then  they  turned  away. 

Meanwhile  my  mother  had  softly  risen,  and  under  pretence 
of  looking  for  her  work  on  the  table  near  him,  bent  over  the 
old  soldier  and  pressed  his  hand. 

"Gentlemen,"  said  my  father,  "I  don't  think  my  brother 
ever  heard  of  Nichocorus,  the  Greek  comic  writer ;  yet  he  has 
illustrated  him  very  ably.  Saith  Xichocorus,  'the  best  cure 
for  drunkenness  is  a  sudden  calamity.'  For  chronic  drunken- 
ness, a  continued  course  of  real  misfortune  must  be  very  salu- 
tary !" 

Xo  answer  came  from  the  two  complainants ;  and  my  father 
took  up  a  great  book. 


CHAPTER  II. 

"  My  friends,"  said  my  father,  looking  up  from  his  book, 
and  addressing  himself  to  his  two  visitors,  "  I  know  of  one 
thing,  milder  than  calamity,  that  would  do  you  both  a  great 
deal  of  good." 

'•What  is  that?"  asked  Sir  Sedley. 

"  A  saffron  bag,  worn  at  the  pit  of  the  stomach  !" 

"  Austin,  my  dear  !"  said  my  mother,  reprovingly. 

My  father  did  not  heed  the  interruption,  but  continued, 
gravely — "  Nothing  is  better  for  the  spirits !  Roland  is  in  no 
want  of  saffron,  because  he  is  a  warrior ;  and  the  desire  of 
fighting,  and  the  hope  of  victory,  infuse  such  a  heat  into  the 
spirits  as  is  profitable  for  long  life,  and  keeps  up  the  system." 

"  Tut !"  said  Trevanion. 


Tin:  (A.\  ions: 

kv  But  gentlemen  in  your  predicament  musl  have  recourse  to 
artificial  means.  Nitre  in  broth,  for  instance — about  three 
grains  to  ten — (cattle  fed  upon  nitre  grow  Gat);   or  earthy 

odoun ii<-li  as  exist  in  cucumbers  and  cabbage.     A  certain 

great  lord  had  a  clod  of  fresh  earth,  laid  in  a  napkin,  put  under 
his  nose  every  morning  after  sleep.  Light  anointing  of  the 
head  with  oil,  mixed  with  roses  and  salt,  is  not  bad  ;  but,  upon 
the  whole,  I  prescribe  the  saffron  bag  at  the — " 

'•Sisty,  my  dear,  will  you  look  for  my  scissors?"  said  my 
mother. 

"What  nonsense  are  you  talking!  Question!  question!" 
cried  Mr.  Trevanion. 

"  Xonsense !"  exclaimed  my  father,  opening  his  eyes  :  "  I  am 
giving  you  the  advice  of  Lord  Bacon.  You  want  conviction 
— conviction  comes  from  passion — passion  from  the  spirits — 
spirits  from  a  saffron  bag.  You,  Beaudesert,  on  the  other 
hand,  want  to  keep  youth.  He  keeps  youth  longest  who  lives 
longest.  Nothing  more  conduces  to  longevity  than  a  saffron 
bag,  provided  always  it  is  worn  at  the — " 

"  Sisty,  my  thimble  !"  said  my  mother. 

"  You  laugh  at  us  justly,"  said  Beaudesert,  smiling ;  "  and 
the  same  remedy,  I  dare  say,  would  cure  us  both !" 

"  Yes,"  said  my  father,  "  there  is  no  doubt  of  that.  In  the 
pit  of  the  stomach  is  that  great  central  web  of  nerves  called 
the  o-anglions ;  thence  they  affect  the  head  and  the  heart.  Mr. 
Squills  proved  that  to  us,  Sisty." 

"  Yes,"  said  I ;  "  but  I  never  heard  Mr.  Squills  talk  of  a  saf- 
fron bag." 

"  Oh,  foolish  boy !  it  is  not  the  saffron  bag — it  is  the  belief 
in  the  saffron  bag.  Apply  belief  to  the  centre  of  the  nerves, 
and  all  will  go  well,"  said  my  father. 


CHAPTER  III. 

"  But  it  is  a  devil  of  a  thing  to  have  too  nice  a  conscience !" 
quoth  the  member  of  Parliament. 

'•And  it  is  cot  an  angel  of  a  thing  to  lose  one's  front  teeth  I" 
Bighed  the  fine  gentleman. 

Therewith  my  father  rose,  and  putting  his  hand  into  his 
waistcoat,  mobi  swo,  delivered  his  famous 


A    FAMILY   PICTUEE.  137 

SERMON  UPON  THE  CONNECTION  BETWEEN  FAITH  AND  PURPOSE. 

Famous  it  was  in  our  domestic  circle.  But,  as  yet,  it  has  not 
gone  beyond.  And  since  the  reader,  I  am  sure,  does  not  turn 
to  Caxton  Memoirs  with  the  expectation  of  finding  sermons, 
so  to  that  circle  let  its  fame  be  circumscribed.  All  I  shall  say 
about  it  is,  that  it  was  a  very  fine  sermon,  and  that  it  proved 
indisputably,  to  me  at  least,  the  salubrious  effects  of  a  saffron 
bag  applied  to  the  great  centre  of  the  nervous  system.  But 
the  wise  Ali  saith,  that  "  a  fool  doth  not  know  what  maketh 
him  look  little,  neither  will  he  hearken  to  him  that  adviseth 
him."  I  cannot  assert  that  my  father's  friends  were  fools,  but 
they  certainly  came  under  this  definition  of  Folly. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

For  therewith  arose,  not  conviction,  but  discussion ;  Trevan- 
ion  was  logical,  Beaudesert  sentimental.  My  father  held  firm 
to  the  saffron  bag.  When  James  the  First  dedicated  to  the 
Duke  of  Buckingham  his  meditation  on  the  Lords  Prayer,  he 
gave  a  very  sensible  reason  for  selecting  his  grace  for  that  hon- 
our ;  "  For,"  saith  the  king,  "  it  is  made  upon  a  very  short  and 
plain  prayer,  and  therefore  the  fitter  for  a  courtier,  for  courtiers 
are  for  the  most  part  thought  neither  to  have  lust  nor  leisure 
to  say  long  prayers ;  liking  best  courte  messe  et  long  disner." 
I  suppose  it  was  for  a  similar  reason  that  my  father  persisted 
in  dedicating  to  the  member  of  Parliament  and  the  fine  gentle- 
man this  "  short  and  plain e"  morality  of  his — to  wit,  the  saffron 
bag.  He  was  evidently  persuaded,  if  he  could  once  get  them 
to  apply  that,  it  was  all  that  was  needful ;  that  they  had  neither 
lust  nor  leisure  for  longer  instructions.  And  this  saffron  bag, 
— it  came  down  with  such  a  whack,  at  every  round  in  the  ar- 
gument !  You  would  have  thought  my  father  one  of  the  old 
plebeian  combatants  in  the  popular  ordeal,  who,  forbidden  to 
use  sword  and  lance,  fought  with  a  sand-bag  tied  to  a  flail :  a 
very  stunning  weapon  it  wTas  when  filled  only  with  sand ;  but 
a  bag  filled  with  saffron, — it  was  irresistible  !  Though  my  fa- 
ther had  two  to  one  against  him,  they  could  not  stand  such  a 
deuce  of  a  weapon.  And  after  tuts  and  pishes  innumerable 
from  Mr.  Trevairion,  and  sundry  bland  grimaces  from  Sir  Sed- 


I  38  in i:  c.wtoxs: 

ley  Beaudesert,  they  fairly  gave  in,  though  they  would  not 
own  they  were  beaten. 

M  Enough,"  said  the  member,  "I  see  that  yon  don't  compre- 
hend me  ;  I  musl  continue  to  move  by  own  impulse." 

My  father's  pel  book  was  the  Colloquies  of  Erasmus;  lie  was 
wont  t"  say  that  those  Colloquies  furnished  life  with  illustra- 
t  ions  in  every  ]  >age.  Out  of  the  Colloquies  of  Erasmus  he  now 
answered  the  member  : — 

"Rabirius,  Mauling  his  servant  Cyrus  to  get  up,"  quoth  my 
father,  "cried  out  to  him  to  move.  'I  do  move,'  said  Cyrus. 
'I  see  you  move,'  replied  Rabirius,  'but  you  move  nothing? 
To  return  to  the  saffron  bag — " 

"  Confound  the  saffron  bag !"  cried  Trevanion,  in  a  rage ;  and 
then  softening  his  look  as  he  drew  on  his  gloves,  he  turned  to 
my  mother,  and  said,  with  more  politeness  than  was  natural  to, 
or  at  least  customary  with  him — 

"  By  the  way,  my  dear  Mrs.  Caxton,  I  should  tell  you  that 
Lady  Ellinor  comes  to  town  to-morrow,  on  purpose  to  call  on 
you.  We  shall  be  here  some  little  time,  Austin  ;  and  though 
London  is  so  empty,  there  are  still  some  persons  of  note  to 
whom  I  should  like  to  introduce  you,  and  yours — " 

k-  Nay,"  said  my  father  ;  "  your  world  and  my  world  are  not 
the  same.  Books  for  me,  and  men  for  you.  Neither  Kitty 
nor  I  can  change  our  habits,  even  for  friendship  ;  she  has  a 
great  piece  of  work  to  finish,  and  so  have  I.  Mountains  can- 
not stir,  especially  when  in  labour ;  but  Mohammed  can  come 
to  the  mountain  as  often  as  he  likes." 

.Mr.  Trevanion  insisted,  and  Sir  Sedley  Beaudesert  mildly  put 
in  Ins  own  claims;  both  boasted  acquaintance  with  literary 
men,  whom  my  father  would,  at  all  events,  be  pleased  to  meet. 
My  father  doubted  whether  he  could  meet  any  literary  men 
more  eloquent  than  Cicero,  or  more  amusing  than  Aristoph- 
g  ;  and  observed,  that  if  such  did  exist,  he  would  rather 
meel  them  in  their  books  than  in  a  drawing-room.  In  fine,he 
w  as  immovable  ;  and  so  also,  with  less  argument,  was  Captain 
Roland. 

Then  Mr.  Trevanion  turned  to  me. 

"Your  son.  :ii  all  events,  should  Bee  something  of  the  world." 

My  mother's  Bofi  eye  sparkled. 

"My  dear  friend,  I  thank  y<.lu*,  said  my  father,  touched ; 
"and  Pisistratus  and  I  will  talk  it  over." 


A   FAMILY    PICTUEE.  139 

Our  guests  had  departed.  All  four  of  us  gathered  to  the 
open  window,  and  enjoyed  in  silence  the  cool  air  and  the  moon- 
light. 

"Austin,"  said  my  mother  at  last,  "  I  fear  it  is  for  my  sake 
that  you  refuse  going  amongst  your  old  friends  :  you  knew  I 
should  be  frightened  by  such  fine  people,  and — " 

"  And  we  have  been  happy  for  more  than  eighteen  years 
without  them,  Kitty !  My  poor  friends  are  not  happy,  and  we 
are.  To  leave  well  alone  is  a  golden  rule  worth  all  in  Pythag- 
oras. The  ladies  of  Bubastis,  my  dear,  a  place  in  Egypt  where 
the  cat  was  worshipped,  always  kept  rigidly  aloof  from  the 
gentlemen  in  Athribis,  who  adored  the  shrew-mice.  Cats  are 
domestic  animals, — your  shrew-mice  are  sad  gadabouts :  you 
can't  find  a  better  model,  my  Kitty,  than  the  ladies  of  Bu- 
bastis!" 

"How  Trevanion  is  altered!"  said  Roland,  musingly — "he 
who  was  so  lively  and  ardent !" 

"  He  ran  too  fast  up-hill  at  first,  and  has  been  out  of  breath 
ever  since,"  said  my  lather. 

"  And  Lady  Ellinor,"  said  Roland,  hesitatingly,  "  shall  you 
see  her  to-morrow  ?" 

"  Yes !"  said  my  father,  calmly. 

As  Captain  Roland  spoke,  something  in  the  tone  of  his  ques- 
tion seemed  to  flash  a  conviction  on  my  mother's  heart, — the 
woman  there  was  quick :  she  drew  back,  turning  pale,  even  in 
the  moonlight,  and  fixed  her  eyes  on  my  father,  while  I  felt  her 
hand,  which  had  clasped  mine,  tremble  convulsively. 

I  understood  her.  Yes,  this  Lady  Ellinor  was  the  early 
rival  whose  name  till  then  she  had  not  known.  She  fixed  her 
eyes  on  my  father,  and  at  his  tranquil  tone  and  quiet  look  she 
breathed  more  freely,  and,  sliding  her  hand  from  mine,  rested 
it  fondly  on  his  shoulder.  A  few  moments  afterwards,  I  and 
Captain  Roland  found  ourselves  standing  alone  by  the  window. 

"  You  are  young,  nephew,"  said  the  Captain ;  "and  you  have 
the  name  of  a  fallen  family  to  raise.  Your  father  does  well 
not  to  reject  for  you  that  opening  into  the  great  world  which 
Trevanion  offers.  As  for  me,  my  business  in  London  seems 
over :  I  cannot  find  what  I  came  to  seek.  I  have  sent  for  my 
daughter ;  when  she  arrives  I  shall  return  to  my  old  tower ; 
and  the  man  and  the  rum  will  crumble  away  together." 

"  Tush,  uncle !  I  must  work  hard  and  get  money ;  and  then 


140  ni>:  caxtons: 

we  will  repair  the  old  tower,  and  buy  back  the  old  estate.  My 
father  shall  sell  the  red  brick  house;  we  will  tit  him  u]>  a  li- 
brary in  the  keep;  and  we  will  all  live  united,  in  peace, and  in 
state,  as  grand  as  our  ancestors  before  us." 

While  I  thus  spoke, my  uncle's  eves  were  fixed  upon  a  cor- 
ner of  the  street,  where  a  figure,  half  in  shade,  half  in  moon- 
light. Stood  motionless.  "Ah!"  said  I,  following  his  eye,  "I 
have  observed  that  man,  two  or  three  times,  pass  n]»  and  down 
the  street  on  the  other  side  of  the  way,  and  turn  his  head  to- 
wards our  window.  Our  guests  were  with  us  then,  and  my 
lather  in  full  discourse,  or  I  should  have  — " 

Before  I  could  finish  the  sentence,  my  uncle,  stifling  an  ex- 
clamation, broke  away,  hurried  out  of  the  room,  stumped  down 
the  stairs,  and  was  in  the  street,  while  I  was  yet  rooted  to  the 
spot  with  surprise.  I  remained  at  the  window,  and  my  eye 
re-ted  on  the  figure.  I  saw  the  Captain,  with  his  bare  head 
and  his  gray  hair,  cross  the  street;  the  figure  started,  turned 
the  corner,  and  fled. 

Then  I  followed  my  uncle,  and  arrived  in  time  to  save  him 
from  falling:  he  leant  his  head  on  my  breast,  and  I  heard  him 
murmur, — "It  is  he — it  is  he!  He  has  watched  us! — he  re- 
pents !" 


CHAPTER  V. 

The  next  day  Lady  Ellinor  called ;  but,  to  my  great  disap- 
pointment, without  Fanny. 

Whether  or  not  some  joy  at  the  incident  of  the  previous 
night  had  served  to  rejuvenate  my  uncle,  I  know  not,  but  he 
looked  to  me  ten  years  younger  when  Lady  Ellinor  entered. 
How  carefully  the  buttoned-up  coat  was  brushed!  how  new 
and  glossy  was  the  black  stock!  The  poor  Captain  was  restored 
to  his  pride, and  mighty  proud  he  looked!  With  a  glow  on 
his  cheek,  and  a  fire  in  his  eye;   his  head  thrown  back,  and  his 

whole  air  composed,  seyere,  Mavortian,  and  majestic,  as  if 
awaiting  the  charge  of  the  French  cuirassiers  at  the  head  of  his 
detachment. 

My  lather,  on  the  contrary,  was  as  usual  (till  dinner,  when 
he  always  dressed  punctiliously,  0U1  of  respect  to  his  Kitty)  in 
his  easy  morning-gown  and  slippers;  and  nothing  bu1  a  cer- 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  141 

tain  compression  in  his  lips,  which  had  lasted  all  the  morning, 
evinced  his  anticipation  of  the  visit,  or  the  emotion  it  caused 
him. 

Lady  Ellinor  behaved  beautifully.  She  could  not  conceal  a 
certain  nervous  trepidation,  when  she  first  took  the  hand  my 
father  extended;  and,  in  touching  rebuke  of  the  Captain's 
stately  bow,  she  held  out  to  him  the  hand  left  disengaged,  with 
a  look  which  brought  Roland  at  once  to  her  side.  It  was  a 
desertion  of  his  colours  to  which  nothing,  short  of  Ney's  shame- 
ful conduct  at  Napoleon's  return  from  Elba,  affords  a  parallel 
in  history.  Then,  without  waiting  for  introduction,  and  before 
a  word  indeed  was  said,  Lady  Ellinor  came  to  my  mother  so 
cordially,  so  caressingly — she  threw  into  her  smile,  voice,  man- 
ner, such  winning  sweetness,  that  I,  intimately  learned  in  my 
poor  mother's  simple  loving  heart,  wondered  how  she  refrain- 
ed from  throwing  her  arms  round  Lady  Elhnor's  neck  and  kiss- 
ing her  outright.  It  must  have  been  a  great  conquest  over 
herself  not  to  do  it !  My  turn  came  next :  and  talking  to  me, 
and  about  me,  soon  set  all  parties  at  their  ease — at  least  ap- 
parently. 

What  was  said  I  cannot  remember ;  I  do  not  think  one  of 
us  could.  But  an  hour  slipped  away,  and  there  was  no  gap  in 
the  conversation. 

With  curious  interest,  and  a  survey  I  strove  to  make  impar- 
tial, I  compared  Lady  Ellinor  with  my  mother.  And  I  com- 
prehended the  fascination  which  the  high-born  lady  must,  in 
their  earlier  youth,  have  exercised  over  both  brothers,  so  dis- 
similar to  each  other.  For  charm  was  the  characteristic  of 
Lady  Ellinor — a  charm  indefinable.  It  was  not  the  mere  grace 
of  refined  breeding,  though  that  went  a  great  way :  it  was  a 
charm  that  seemed  to  spring  from  natural  sympathy.  Whom- 
soever she  addressed,  that  person  appeared  for  the  moment  to 
engage  all  her  attention,  to  interest  her  whole  mind.  She  had 
a  gift  of  conversation  very  peculiar.  She  made  what  she  said 
like  a  continuation  of  what  was  said  to  her.  She  seemed  as  if 
she  had  entered  into  your  thoughts,  and  talked  them  aloud. 
Her  mind  was  evidently  cultivated  with  great  care,  but  she 
was  perfectly  void  of  pedantry.  A  hint,  an  allusion,  sufficed  to 
show  how  much  she  knew,  to  one  well  instructed,  without  mor- 
tifying or  perplexing  the  ignorant.  Yes,  there  probably  was 
the  only  woman  my  father  had  ever  met  who  could  be  the  com- 


ii,  re: 

panion  to  bis  mind,  walk  through  the  garden  of  knowledge  by 
his  Bide,  and  trim  the  flowers  while  he  cleared  the  vistas.  On 
the  other  hand,  there  was  an  inborn  nobility  in  Lady  Ellinor's 
sentiments  thai  musj  have  struck  the  most  susceptible  chord 

in  Roland's  nature,  and  the  sentiments  took  eloquence  from  the 
look,  the  mien,  the  sweet  dignity  of  the  very  turn  of  the  head. 
Fes,  Bhe  must  have  been  a  fitting  Oriana  to  a  young  Amadis. 
It  was  not  hard  to  see  that  Lady  Ellinor  was  ambitious — that 
Bhe  had  a  love  of  fame,  for  fame  itself — that  she  was  proud — 
that  she  set  value  (and  that  morbidly)  on  the  world's  opinion. 
This  was  perceptible  when  she  spoke  of  her  husband,  even  of 
her  daughter.  It  seemed  to  me  as  if  she  valued  the  intellect 
of  the  one,  the  beauty  of  the  other,  by  the  gauge  of  the  social 
distinction  it  conferred.  She  took  measure  of  the  gift,  as  I  was 
taught  at  Dr.  Herman's  to  take  measure  of  the  height  of  a  tow- 
er— by  the  length  of  the  shadowr  it  cast  upon  the  ground. 

My  dear  Hither  !  with  such  a  wife  you  would  never  have  lived 
eighteen  years,  shivering  on  the  edge  of  a  Great  Book. 

My  dear  uncle,  with  such  a  wife  you  would  never  have  been 
contented  with  a  cork  leg  and  a  Waterloo  medal !  And  I  un- 
derstand why  Mr.  Trevanion,  "  eager  and  ardent"  as  ye  say  he 
was  in  youth,  with  a  heart  bent  on  the  practical  success  of  life, 
won  the  hand  of  the  heiress.  "Well,  you  see  Mr.  Trevanion  has 
contrived  not  to  be  happy !  By  the  side  of  my  listening,  admir- 
ing mother,  with  her  blue  eyes  moist,  and  her  coral  lips  apart, 
Lady  Ellinor  looks  faded.  Was  she  ever  as  pretty  as  my  moth- 
er is  now?  Never.  But  she  was  much  handsomer.  What 
delicacy  in  the  outline,  and  yet  how  decided  in  spite  of  the  del- 
icacy !  The  eyebrow  so  defined — the  profile  slightly  aquiline 
— so  clearly  cut — with  the  curved  nostril,  which,  if  physiogno- 
mists are  right,  shows  sensibility  so  keen ;  and  the  classic  lip, 
that,  but  for  the  neighbouring  dimple,  would  be  so  haughty. 
But  wear  and  tear  are  in  that  face.  The  nervous  excitable 
temper  lias  helped  the  fret  and  cark  of  ambitious  life.  My 
dear  uncle,  I  know  not  yet  your  private  life.  But  as  for  my 
father,  1  am  sure  that,  though  lie  might  have  done  more  on 
earth,  he  would  have  been  Less  fit  for  heaven,  if  he  had  married 
Lady  Ellinor. 

Al  last  this  visit — dreaded,  T  am  sure,  by  three  of  the  party, 
was  over,  but  not  before  I  had  promised  to  dine  at  the  Tre- 
vanions'  that  day. 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  143 

When  we  were  again  alone,  my  father  threw  off  a  long- 
breath,  and,  looking  round  him  cheerfully,  said,  "  Since  Pisis- 
tratus  deserts  us,  let  us  console  ourselves  for  his  absence — send 
for  brother  Jack,  and  all  four  go  down  to  Richmond  to  drink 
tea." 

"  Thank  you,  Austin,"  said  Roland  ;  "  but  I  don't  want  it,  I 
assure  you !" 

"Upon  your  honour?"  said  my  father,  in  a  half-whisper. 

"Upon  my  honour." 

"  Nor  I  either  !  So,  my  dear  Kitty,  Roland  and  I  will  take 
a  walk,  and  will  be  back  in  time  to  see  if  that  young  Anachro- 
nism looks  as  handsome  as  his  new  London-made  clothes  will 
allow  him.  Properly  speaking,  he  ought  to  go  with  an  apple 
in  his  hand,  and  a  dove  in  his  bosom.  But  now  I  think  of  it, 
that  was  luckily  not  the  fashion  with  the  Athenians  till  the 
time  of  Alcibiades !" 


CHAPTER  YI. 

You  may  judge  of  the  effect  that  my  dinner  at  Mr.  Trevan- 
ion's,  with  a  long  conversation  after  it  with  Lady  Ellinor, 
made  upon  my  mind,  when,  on  my  return  home,  after  having 
satisfied  all  questions  of  parental  curiosity,  I  said  nervously, 
and  looking  down, — "My  dear  father, — I  should  like  very 
much,  if  you  have  no  objection — to — to — " 

"  What,  my  dear  ?"  asked  my  father,  kindly. 

"Accept  an  offer  Lady  Ellinor  has  made  me,  on  the  part  of 
Mr.  Trevanion.  He  wants  a  secretary.  He  is  kind  enough  to 
excuse  my  inexperience,  and  declares  I  shall  do  very  well,  and 
can  soon  get  into  his  ways.  Lady  Ellinor  says  (I  continued 
with  dignity)  that  it  will  be  a  great  opening  in  public  life  for 
me;  and  at  all  events,  my  dear  father,  I  shall  see  much  of  the 
world,  and  learn  what  I  really  think  will  be  more  useful  to  me 
than  anything  they  will  teach  me  at  college." 

My  mother  looked  anxiously  at  my  father.  "  It  will  indeed 
be  a  great  thing  for  Sisty,"  said  she,  timidly ;  and  then,  taking 
courage,  she  added — "  and  that  is  just  the  sort  of  life  he  is 
formed  for." 

"  Hem !"  said  my  uncle. 

My  father  rubbed  his  spectacles  thoughtfully,  and  replied, 
after  a  long  pause, — 


144  mi:  i  Avro.vs  ; 

"You  may  be  right,  Kitty:  T  don't  think  Pisistratus  is 
meant  for  study;  action  will  suit  him  better.    13  ut  what  does 

this  office  lead  to?" 

"  Public  employment,  sir,"  said  I,  boldly;  "the  service  of 
my  country." 

"  If  that  be  the  case,"  quoth  Roland,  "I  have  not  a  word  to 
Bay.  !>ut  I  should  have  thought  that  for  a  lad  of  spirit,  a  de- 
scendant of  the  old  De  Caxtons,  the  army  would  have — " 

'•The  army!"  exclaimed  my  mother,  clasping  her  hands, 
and  looking  involuntarily  at  my  uncle's  cork  leg. 

"The  army!"  repeated  my  father,  peevishly.  "Bless  my 
soul,  Roland,  you  seem  to  think  man  is  made  for  nothing  else 
but  to  be  shot  at!  You  would  not  like  the  army,  Pisis- 
tratus?" 

"  Why,  sir,  not  if  it  pained  you  and  my  dear  mother ;  other- 
wise, indeed — " 

"  Papa3 !"  said  my  father,  interrupting  me.  "  This  all  comes 
of  your  giving  the  boy  that  ambitious,  uncomfortable  name, 
Mrs.  Caxton;  what  could  a  Pisistratus  be  but  the  plague  of 
one's  life?  That  idea  of  serving  his  country  is  Pisistratus 
ip-issimus  all  over.  If  ever  I  have  another  son  {Dii  meliora!) 
he  has  only  got  to  be  called  Eratostratus,  and  then  he  will  be 
burning  down  St.  Paul's ;  which  I  believe  was,  by  the  way, 
first  made  out  of  the  stones  of  a  temple  to  Diana !  Of  the 
two,  certainly,  you  had  better  serve  your  country  with  a  goose- 
quill  than  by  poking  a  bayonet  into  the  ribs  of  some  unfortu- 
nate Indian ;  I  don't  think  there  are  any  other  people  whom 
the  service  of  one's  country  makes  it  necessary  to  kill  just  at 
present, — eh,  Roland  ?" 

"  It  is  a  very  fine  field,  India,"  said  my  uncle,  sententiously : 
"it  is  the  nursery  of  captains." 

"  Is  it  ?  Those  plants  take  up  a  great  deal  of  ground,  then, 
that  might  be  more  profitably  cultivated.  And,  indeed,  con- 
sidering that  the  tallest  captains  in  the  world  will  be  ultimately 
set  into  a  box  not  above  seven  feet  at  the  longest,  it  is  aston- 
ishing what  a  quantity  of  room  that  species  of  arbor  mortis 
takes  in  the  growing  1  However,  Pisistratus,  to  return  to 
your  request,  L  will  think  it  over,  and  talk  to  Trcvanion." 

"Or  rather  to  LadyEllinor,"  said  I,  imprudently;  my  mother 
sli'jhily  shivered,  and  took  her  hand  from  mine.  I  felt  cut  to 
ill  •  heart  by  the  slip  of  mj  own  tongue. 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  145 

"  That,  I  think,  your  mother  could  do  best,"  said  my  father, 
drily,  "if  she  wants  to  be  quite  convinced  that  somebody  will 
see  that  your  shirts  are  aired.  For  I  suppose  they  mean  you 
to  lodge  at  Trevanion's." 

"  Oh,  no !"  cried  my  mother ;  "  he  might  as  well  go  to  col- 
lege then.  I  thought  he  was  to  stay  with  us ;  only  go  in  the 
morning,  but,  of  course,  sleep  here." 

"  If  I  know  anything  of  Trevanion,"  said  my  father,  "  his 
secretary  will  be  expected  to  do  without  sleep.  Poor  boy ! 
You  don't  know  what  it  is  you  desire.  And  yet  at  your  age, 
I" — my  father  stopped  short.  "No!"~he  renewed  abruptly 
after  a  long  silence,  and  as  if  soliloquizing — "No :  man  is  never 
wrong  while  he  lives  for  others.  The  philosopher  who  con- 
templates from  the  rock  is  a  less  noble  image  than  the  sailor 
who  struggles  with  the  storm.  Why  should  there  be  two  of 
us  ?  And  could  he  be  an  alter  ego,  even  if  I  wished  it  ?  Im- 
possible !"  My  father  turned  on  his  chair,  and  laying  the  left 
leg  on  the  right  knee,  said  smilingly,  as  he  bent  down  to  look 
me  full  in  the  face :  "  But,  Pisistratus,  will  you  promise  me  al- 
ways to  wear  the  saffron  bag  ?" 


CHAPTER  VII. 

I  now  make  a  long  stride  in  my  narrative.  I  am  domesti- 
cated with  the  Trevanions.  A  very  short  conversation  with 
the  statesman  sufficed  to  decide  my  father ;  and  the  pith  of  it 
lay  in  this  single  sentence  uttered  by  Trevanion—"  I  promise 
you  one  thing — he  shall  never  be  idle !" 

Looking  back,  I  am  convinced  that  my  father  was  right, 
and  that  he  understood  .my  character,  and  the  temptations  to 
which  I  was  most  prone,  when  he  consented  to  let  me  resign 
college  and  enter  thus  prematurely  on  the  world  of  men.  I 
was  naturally  so  joyous,  that  I  should  have  made  college  life 
a  holiday,  and  then,  in  repentance,  worked  myself  into  a 
phthisis. 

And  my  father,  too,  was  right,  that,  though  I  could  study, 
I  was  not  meant  for  a  student. 

After  all,  the  thing  was  an  experiment.  I  had  time  to 
spare ;  if  the  experiment  failed,  a  year's  delay  would  not  nec- 
essarily be  a  year's  loss. 

G 


1  tO  I  m:   «  AJETONS  : 

I  am  ensconced,  then,  at  Mr.  Treyanion'd.  I  have  been 
there  Borne  months — ii  is  Late  in  the  winter;  parliament  and 
the  season  have  commenced.     I  work  hard — Heaven  knows 

harder  than  I  should  have  worked  at  college.  Take  a  day  for 
sample. 

Trevanion  gets  up  at  eight  o'clock,  and  in  all  weathers  rides 
an  hour  before  breakfast ;  at  nine  he  takes  that  meal  in  his 
wife's  dressing-room;  at  halt-past  nine  he  comes  into  his  study. 
By  that  time  he  expects  to  find  done  by  his  secretary  the  work 
1  am  about  to  describe. 

On  coming  home,  or  rather  before  going  to  bed,  which  is 
usually  after  three  o'clock,  it  is  Mr.  Trevanion's  habit  to  leave 
on  the  table  of  the  said  study  a  list  of  directions  for  the  secre- 
tary. The  following,  which  I  take  at  random  from  many  I 
have  preserved,  may  show  their  multifarious  nature  : — 

1.  Look  out  in  the  Reports  (Committee  House  of  Lords)  for  the  last 
seven  years — all  that  is  said  about  the  growth  of  flax— mark  the  passages 
for  me. 

2.  Do.  do. — ''Irish  Emigration." 

3.  Hunt  out  second  volume  of  Karnes's  History  of  Man,  passage  contain- 
ing "Reid's  Logic" — don't  know  where  the  book  is  ! 

4.  How  does  the  line  beginning  "Lumina  conjurent,  inter"  something, 
end?     Is  it  in  Gray?     See! 

5.  Fracastorius  writes — '-Quantum  hoc  wfecit  vitium,  quot  adiverit 
urbes."  Query,  ought  it  not  in  strict  grammar  to  be — infecerit  instead  of 
infecit?     If  you  don't  know,  write  to  father. 

C.  Write  the  four  letters  in  full  from  the  notes  I  leave,  i.  c.  about  the 
Ecclesiastical  Courts. 

7.  Look  out  Population  Returns — strike  average  of  last  five  years  (between 
mortality  and  births)  in  Devonshire  and  Lancashire. 

8.  Answer  these  six  begging  letters,  "No" — civilly. 

9.  The  other  six,  to  constituents — "that  I  have  no  interest  with  Govern- 
ment.'' 

10.  See,  if  you  have  time,  whether  any  of  the  new  books  on  the  round 
table  are  not  trash. 

11.  I  want  to  know  all  about  Indian  corn. 

12.  Lonpinus  says  something,  somewhere,  in  regret  for  uncongenial  pur- 
suits (public  life,  I  suppose) — what  is  it  ?  N.B. — Longinus  is  not  in  my 
London  Catalogue,  but  is  here,  I  know — I  think  in  a  box  in  the  lumber- 
room. 

1."..  Set  right  the  calculation  I  leave  on  the  poor-rates.  I  have  made  a 
blunder  somewhere.     &c.  &c. 

( '<  rtainly  my  father  knew  Mr.  Trevanion;  he  never  expect- 

ed  a  secretary  to  sleep !     To  get  through  the  work  required 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  147 

of  me  by  half-past  nine,  I  get  up  by  candle-light.  At  half-past 
nine  I  am  still  hunting  for  Longinus,  when  Mr.  Trevanion 
comes  in  with  a  bundle  of  letters. 

Answers  to  half  the  said  letters  fall  to  my  share.  Direc- 
tions verbal — in  a  species  of  short-hand  talk.  While  I  write, 
Mr.  Trevanion  reads  the  newspapers — examines  what  I  have 
done — makes  notes  therefrom,  some  for  Parliament,  some  for 
conversation,  some  for  correspondence — skims  over  the  Par- 
liamentary papers  of  the  morning — and  jots  down  directions 
for  extracting,  abridging,  and  comparing  them  with  others, 
perhaps  twenty  years  old.  At  eleven  he  walks  down  to  a 
Committee  of  the  House  of  Commons — leaving  me  plenty  to 
do — till  half-past  three,  when  he  returns.  At  four,  Fanny  puts 
her  head  into  the  room — and  I  lose  mine.  Four  days  in  the 
week  Mr.  Trevanion  then  disappears  for  the  rest  of  the  day — 
dines  at  Bellamy's  or  a  club — expects  me  at  the  House  at  eight 
o'clock,  in  case  he  thinks  of  something,  wants  a  fact  or  a  quo- 
tation. He  then  releases  me — generally  with  a  fresh  list  of 
instructions.  But  I  have  my  holidays,  nevertheless.  On 
Wednesdays  and  Saturdays  Mr.  Trevanion  gives  dinners,  and 
I  meet  the  most  eminent  men  of  the  day — on  both  sides.  For 
Trevanion  is  on  both  sides  himself — or  no  side  at  all,  wmich 
comes  to  the  same  thing.  On  Tuesdays,  Lady  Ellinor  gives 
me  a  ticket  for  the  Opera,  and  I  get  there  at  least  in  time  for 
the  ballet.  I  have  already  invitations  enough  to  balls  and 
soirees,  for  I  am  regarded  as  an  only  son  of  great  expectations. 
I  am  treated  as  becomes  a  Caxton  who  has  the  right,  if  he 
pleases,  to  put  a  De  before  his  name.  I  have  grown  very 
smart.  I  have  taken  a  passion  for  dress,  natural  to  eighteen. 
I  like  everything  I  do,  and  every  one  about  me.  I  am  over 
head  and  ears  in  love  with  Fanny  Trevanion — who  breaks  my 
heart,  nevertheless ;  for  she  flirts  with  two  peers,  a  life-guards- 
man, three  old  members  of  parliament,  Sir  Sedley  Beaudesert, 
one  ambassador,  and  all  his  attaches,  and,  positively  (the  au- 
dacious minx !)  with  a  bishop,  in  full  wig  and  apron,  who, 
people  say,  means  to  marry  again. 

Pisistratus  has  lost  colour  and  flesh.  His  mother  says  he  is 
very  much  improved, — that  he  takes  to  be  the  natural  effect 
produced  by  Stultz  and  Hoby.  Uncle  Jack  says  he  is  "  fined 
down." 

His  father  looks  at  him  and  writes  to  Trevanion, — 


L48  the  i  ajctons: 

"  I  >ear  T.—  I  refused  a  salary  for  my  son.  Give  him  a  horse, 
and  two  hours  a  day  to  ride  it.     Yours,  A.  C." 

The  next  day  I  am  master  of  a  pretty  hay  mare,  and  riding 
by  the  side  of  Fanny  Trevanion,    Alas!  alas! 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

I  nave  not  mentioned  my  Uncle  Roland.  He  is  gone — 
abroad — to  fetch  his  daughter.  He  has  stayed  longer  than 
was  expected.  Does  he  seek  his  son  still — there  as  here? 
My  father  has  finished  the  first  portion  of  his  work,  in  two 
great  volumes.  Uncle  Jack,  who  for  some  time  has  been 
looking  melancholy,  and  who  now  seldom  stirs  out,  except  on 
Sundays  (on  which  days  we  all  meet  at  my  father's  and  dine 
together) — Uncle  Jack,  I  say,  has  undertaken  to  sell  it. 

"  Don't  be  over  sanguine,"  says  Uncle  Jack,  as  he  locks  up 
the  MS.  in  two  red  boxes  with  a  slit  in  the  lids,  which  belong- 
ed to  one  of  the  defunct  companies.  "  Don't  be  over  sanguine 
as  to  the  price.  These  publishers  never  venture  much  on  a 
first  experiment.  They  must  be  talked  even  into  looking  at 
the  book." 

"  Oh  !"  said  my  father,  "  if  they  will  publish  it  at  all,  and  at 
their  own  risk,  I  should  not  stand  out  for  any  other  terms. 
'  Nothing  great,'  said  Dryden, '  ever  came  from  a  venal  pen !'  " 

"  An  uncommonly  foolish  observation  of  Dryden's,"  return- 
ed Uncle  Jack  :  "  he  ought  to  have  known  better." 

"  So  he  did,"  said  I,  "  for  he  used  his  pen  to  fill  his  pockets 
— poor  man !" 

"But  the  pen  was  not  venal,  master  Anachronism,"  said 
my  father.  "  A  baker  is  not  to  be  called  veual  if  he  sells  his 
loaves — he  is  venal  if  he  sells  himself:  Dryden  only  sold  his 
loaves." 

"And  we  must  sell  yours,"  said  Uncle  Jack,  emphatically. 
"  A  thousand  pounds  the  volume  will  be  about  the  mark,  eh !" 

"A  thousand  pounds  a  volume !"  cried  my  father.  "Gib- 
bon, I  fancy,  did  not  receive  more." 

"  Very  likely;  Gibbon  had  not  an  Uncle  Jack  to  look  after 
his  interests,"  said  Mr.  Tibbets,  laughing  and  rubbing  those 
smooth  hands  <»{'  his.  "No!  i\\<>  thousand  pounds  the  two 
volumes  !  a  sacrifice,  but  still  I  recommend  moderation." 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  149 

"I  should  be  happy,  indeed,  if  the  book  brought  in  any- 
thing," said  my  father,  evidently  fascinated  ;  "  for  that  young 
gentleman  is  rather  expensive ;  and  you,  my  dear  Jack — per- 
haps half  the  sum  may  be  of  use  to  you!" 

"  To  me  !  my  dear  brother,"  cried  Uncle  Jack — "  to  me ! 
why,  when  my  new  speculation  has  succeeded,  I  shall  be  a  mil- 
lionaire !" 

"Have  you  a  new  speculation,  uncle,"  said  I,  anxiously. 
"What  is  it?" 

"  Mum !"  said  my  uncle,  putting  his  finger  to  his  lip,  and 
looking  all  round  the  room — "  Mum  ! !  Mum ! !" 

Pisistratus. — "  A  Grand  National  Company  for  blowing  up 
both  Houses  of  Parliament !" 

Mr.  Caxton. — "  Upon  my  life,  I  hope  something  newer  than 
that ;  for  they,  to  judge  by  the  newspapers,  don't  want  broth- 
er Jack's  assistance  to  blow  up  each  other!" 

Uncle  Jack  (mysteriously). — "Newspapers!  you  don't  oft- 
en read  a  newspaper,  Austin  Caxton  !" 

Me.  Caxton.— "  Granted,  John  Tibbets !" 

Uncle  Jack. — "  But  if  my  speculation  make  you  read  a 
newspaper  every  day?" 

Mr.  Caxton  (astounded). — "Make  me  read  a  newspaper 
every  day !" 

Uncle  Jack  (warming,  and  expanding  his  hands  to  the  fire). 
— "  As  big  as  the  Times  /" 

Mr.  Caxton  (uneasily). — "Jack,  you  alarm  me!" 

Uncle  Jack. — "  And  make  you  write  in  it  too — a  leader  !" 

Mr.  Caxton,  pushing  back  his  chair,  seizes  the  only  weapon 
at  his  command,  and  hurls  at  Uncle  Jack  a  great  sentence  of 
Greek — "To'jc  pzv  yap  eivai  ^aXe-trove,  orre  km  avdpujTrocpayEiv  /"* 

Uncle  Jack  (nothing  daunted). — "Ay,  and  put  as  much 
Greek  as  you  like  into  it !" 

Mr.  Caxton  (relieved  and  softening). — "  My  dear  Jack,  you 
are  a  great  man — let  us  hear  you !" 

Then  Uncle  Jack  began.  Xow,  perhaps  my  readers  may 
have  remarked  that  this  illustrious  speculator  was  really  fortu- 
nate in  his  ideas.     His  speculations  in  themselves  always  had 

*  "  Some  were  so  barbarous  as  to  eat  their  own  species."  The  sentence 
refers  to  the  Scythians,  and  is  in  Strabo.  I  mention  the  authority,  for  Stra- 
bo  is  not  an  author  that  any  man  engaged  on  a  less  work  than  the  History 
of  Human  Error  is  expected  to  have  by  heart. 


150  THE   CAXTONS: 

something  Bound  in  the  kernel,  considering  how  barren  they 
were  in  the  fruit  ;  and  this  it  w  as  that  made  him  so  dangerous. 
The  idea  Inch' .lack  had  now  got  hold  of  will,  I  am  convinced, 

make  a  man's  fortune  one  of  these  days;  and  I  relate  it  with  a 
Bigh,  in  thinking  how  much  has  gone  out  of  the  family.  Know, 
then,  it  was  nothing  less  than  setting  up  a  daily  paper  on  the 
plan  of  the  Times,  but  devoted  entirely  to  Art,  Literature,  and 
Science — Mental  Progress,  in  short ;  I  say  on  the  plan  of  the 
Times,  for  it  was  to  imitate  the  mighty  machinery  of  that  di- 
urnal illuminator.  It  was  to  be  the  Literary  Salmoneus  of  the 
Political  Jupiter,  and  rattle  its  thunder  over  the  bridge  of 
knowledge.  It  was  to  have  correspondents  in  all  parts  of  the 
globe ;  everything  that  related  to  the  chronicle  of  the  mind, 
from  the  labor  of  the  missionary  in  the  South  Sea  Islands,  or 
the  research  of  a  traveller  in  the  pursuit  of  that  mirage  called 
Timbuctoo,  to  the  last  new  novel  at  Paris,  or  the  last  great 
emendation  of  a  Greek  particle  at  a  German  university,  was  to 
find  a  place  in  this  focus  of  light.  It  was  to  amuse,  to  instruct, 
to  interest — there  was  nothing  it  was  not  to  do.  Not  a  man 
in  the  whole  reading  public,  not  only  of  the  three  kingdoms, 
not  only  of  the  British  empire,  but  under  the  cope  of  heaven, 
that  it  was  not  to  touch  somewhere,  in  head,  in  heart,  or  in 
pocket.  The  most  crotchety  member  of  the  intellectual  com- 
munity might  find  his  own  hobby  in  those  stables. 

"Think,"  cried  Uncle  Jack, — "think  of  the  march  of  mind 
— think  of  the  passion  for  cheap  knowledge — think  how  little 
quarterly,  monthly,  weekly  journals  can  keep  pace  with  the 
main  wants  of  the  age.  As  well  have  a  weekly  journal  on 
politics,  as  a  weekly  journal  on  all  the  matters  still  more  inter- 
esting than  politics  to  the  mass  of  the  public.  My  Literary 
Tiihes  once  started,  people  will  wonder  how  they  had  ever 
lived  without  it !  Sir,  they  have  not  lived  without  it — they 
have  vegetated — they  have  lived  in  holes  and  caves,  like  the 
Troggledikes." 

"Troglodytes,"  said  my  father,  mildly — "from  trogle,SL  cave 
— and  dumi,  to  go  under.  They  lived  in  Ethiopia,  and  had 
their  wives  in  common." 

"As  to  the  lasl  point,  T  don't  say  that  the  public,  poor  crea- 
tures, are  as  bad  as  that,"  said  Uncle  .lack,  candidly;  "but  no 
simile  holds  good  in  all  its  points.  And  the  public  are  no  less 
Troggledummies, or  whatever  you  call  them, compared  with 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  151 

what  they  will  be  when  living  under  the  full  light  of  my  Liter- 
ary Times.  Sir,  it  will  be  a  revolution  in  the  world.  It  will 
bring  literature  out  of  the  clouds  into  the  parlour,  the  cottage, 
the  kitchen.  The  idlest  dandy,  the  finest  lady,  will  find  some- 
thing to  her  taste ;  the  busiest  man  of  the  mart  and  counter 
will  find  some  acquisition  to  his  practical  knowledge.  The 
practical  man  will  see  the  progress  of  divinity,  medicine,  nay, 
even  law.  Sir,  the  Indian  will  read  me  under  the  banyan ;  I 
shall  be  in  the  seraglios  of  the  East ;  and  over  my  sheets  the 
American  Indian  will  smoke  the  calumet  of  peace.  We  shall 
reduce  politics  to  its  proper  level  in  the  affairs  of  life — raise  lit- 
erature to  its  due  place  in  the  thoughts  and  business  of  men. 
It  is  a  grand  thought ;  and  my  heart  swells  with  pride  while  I 
contemplate  it !" 

"  My  dear  Jack,"  said  my  father,  seriously,  and  rising  with 
emotion,  "  it  is  a  grand  thought,  and  I  honour  you  for  it.  You 
are  quite  right — it  would  be  a  revolution !  It  would  educate 
mankind  insensibly.  Upon  my  life,  I  should  be  proud  to  write 
a  leader,  or  a  paragraph.  Jack,  you  will  immortalize  your- 
self!" 

"  I  believe  I  shall,"  said  Uncle  Jack,  modestly ;  "  but  I  have 
not  said  a  word  yet  on  the  greatest  attraction  of  all." 

"Ah!  and  that?" 

"The  Adveetisemexts !"  cried  my  uncle,  spreading  his 
hands  with  all  the  fingers  at  angles,  like  the  threads  of  a  spi- 
der's web.  "  The  advertisements — oh,  think  of  them ! — a  per- 
fect El  Dorado.  The  advertisements,  sir,  on  the  most  moder- 
ate calculation,  will  bring  us  in  £50,000  a-year.  My  dear  Pisis- 
tratus,  I  shall  never  marry ;  you  are  my  heir.     Embrace  me !" 

So  saying,  my  Uncle  Jack  threw  himself  upon  me,  and 
squeezed  out  of  breath  the  prudential  demur  that  was  rising  to 
my  lips. 

My  poor  mother,  between  laughing  and  sobbing,  faltered  out 
— "  And  it  is  my  brother  who  will  pay  back  to  his  son  all — all 
he  gave  up  for  me !" 

While  my  father  walked  to  and  fro  the  room,  more  excited 
than  ever  I  saw  him  before,  muttering,  "  A  sad  useless  clog 
I  have  been  hitherto !  I  should  like  to  serve  the  world !  I 
should  mdeed !" 

Uncle  Jack  had  fairly  done  it  this  time.  He  had  found  out 
the  only  bait  in  the  world  to  catch  so  shy  a  carp  as  my  father 


L52  TIIK    CAXTONS. 

— "hcuret  lethalis  arundo."  I  saw  thai  the  deadly  hook  was 
within  an  inch  of  my  father's  nose,  and  that  lie  was  gazing  at 
it  with  a  fixed  detennination  to  swallow. 

But  if  it  amused  my  father?  Boy  that  I  was,  T  saw  no  fur- 
ther. I  must  own  I  myself  was  dazzled,  and,  perhaps  with 
childlike  malice,  delighted  at  the  perturbation  of  my  betters. 
The  young  carp  was  pleased,  to  see  the  waters  so  playfully  in 
movement,  when  the  old  carp  waved  his  tail,  and  swayed  him- 
self on  his  this. 

"Mum!1'  said  Uncle  Jack,  releasing  me:  "not  a  word  to 
Mr.  Trevanion,  to  any  one." 

"But  why?" 

"Why?  God  bless  my  soul.  Why?  If  my  scheme  gets 
wind,  do  you  suppose  some  one  will  not  clap  on  sail  to  be  be- 
fore mo^  You  frighten  me  out  of  my  senses.  Promise  me 
faithfully  to  be  silent  as  the  grave." 

"  I  should  like  to  hear  Trevanion's  opinion  too." 

"  As  well  hear  the  town-crier !  Sir,  I  have  trusted  to  your 
honour.  Sir,  at  the  domestic  hearth  all  secrets  are  sacred.  Sir, 
I—" 

"  My  dear  Uncle  Jack,  you  have  said  quite  enough.  Xot  a 
word  will  I  breathe !" 

"I  am  sure  you  may  trust  him,  Jack,"  said  my  mother. 

"And  I  do  trust  him — with  wealth  untold,"  replied  my  un- 
cle. "  May  I  ask  you  for  a  little  water — with  a  trine  of  brandy 
in  it — and  a  biscuit,  or  indeed  a  sandwich.  This  talking  makes 
me  quite  hungry." 

My  eye  fell  upon  Uncle  Jack  as  he  spoke.  Poor  Uncle  Jack, 
he  had  grown  thin! 


PART  SEVENTH. 

CHAPTER  I. 

Saith  Dr.  Luther,  "  When  I  saw  Dr.  Gode  begin  to  tell  his 
puddings  hanging  in  the  chimney,  I  told  him  he  would  not  live 
long !" 

I  wish  I  had  copied  that  passage  from  "  The  Table  Talk"  in 
large  round  hand,  and  set  it  before  my  father  at  breakfast,  the 
morn  preceding  that  fatal  eve  in  which  Uncle  Jack  persuaded 
him  to  tell  his  puddings. 

Yet,  now  I  think  of  it,  Uncle  Jack  hung  the  puddings  in  the 
chimney, — but  he  did  not  persuade  my  father  to  tell'  them. 

Beyond  a  vague  surmise  that  half  the  suspended  "  tomacula" 
would  furnish  a  breakfast  to  Uncle  Jack,  and  that  the  youthful 
appetite  of  Pisistratus  would  despatch  the  rest,  my  father  did 
not  give  a  thought  to  the  nutritious  properties  of  the  puddings, 
— in  other  words,  to  the  two  thousand  pounds  which,  thanks 
to  Mr.  Tibbets,  dangled  down  the  chimney.  So  far  as  the 
Great  Work  was  concerned,  my  father  only  cared  for  its  pub- 
lication, not  its  profits.  I  will  not  say  that  he  might  not  hun- 
ger for  praise,  but  I  am  quite  sure  that  he  did  not  care  a  but- 
ton for  pudding.  Xevertheless,  it  was  an  infaust  and  sinister 
augury  for  Austin  Caxton,  the  very  appearance,  the  very  sus- 
pension and  danglement  of  any  puddings  whatsoever,  right 
over  his  ingle-nook,  when  those  puddings  were  made  by  the 
sleek  hands  of  Uncle  Jack !  Xone  of  the  puddings  which  he, 
poor  man,  had  all  his  life  been  stringing,  whether  from  his  own 
chimneys,  or  the  chimneys  of  other  people,  had  turned  out  to 
be  real  puddings,  —  they  had  always  been  the  eidola,  the 
erscheinungen,  the  phantoms  and  semblances  of  puddings.  I 
question  if  Uncle  Jack  knew  much  about  Democritus  of  Ab- 
dera.  But  he  was  certainly  tainted  with  the  philosophy  of 
that  fanciful  sage.  He  peopled  the  air  with  images  of  colossal 
stature  which  impressed  all  his  dreams  and  divinations,  and 
from  whose  influences  came  his  very  sensations  and  thoughts. 
His  whole  being,  asleep  or  waking,  was  thus  but  the  reflection 
of  great  phantom  puddings  ! 

G2 


[54  ill!:.  a\to\s  : 

A-  Boon  aa  Mr.  Tibbets  had  possessed  himself  of  the  two 
volumes  of  the  "  History  of  Human  Error,"  he  had  necessarily 
established  thai  hold  upon  my  father  which  hitherto  those  lu- 
bricate  hands  of  his  had  failed  to  effect.  He  had  found  what 
lie  had  so  long  sighed  for  in  vain,  his  point  d'appui,  wherein 
to  fix  the  Archimedian  screw.  He  fixed  it  tight  in  the  "His- 
tory of  Hainan  Error,"1  and  moved  the  Caxtonian  world. 

A  day  or  two  after  the  conversation  recorded  in  my  last 
chapter,  I  saw  Uncle  Jack  coming  out  of  the  mahogany  doors 
of  my  father's  banker;  and,  from  that  time,  there  seemed  no 
reason  why  Mr.  Tibbets  should  not  visit  his  relations  on  week- 
days as  well  as  Sundays.  Not  a  day,  indeed,  passed  but  what 
he  held  long  conversations  with  my  father.  He  had  much  to 
report  of  his  interviews  with  the  publishers.  In  these  con- 
versations he  naturally  recurred  to  that  grand  idea  of  the 
"Literary  Times,"  which  had  so  dazzled  my  poor  father's 
imagination  ;  and,  having  heated  the  iron,  Uncle  Jack  was  too 
knowing  a  man  not  to  strike  while  it  was  hot. 

When  I  think  of  the  simplicity  my  wise  father  exhibited  in 
this  crisis  of  his  life,  I  must  own  that  I  am  less  moved  by  pity 
than  admiration  for  that  poor  great-hearted  student.  We 
have  seen  that  out  of  the  learned  indolence  of  twenty  years, 
the  ambition  which  is  the  instinct  of  a  man  of  genius  had 
emerged ;  the  serious  preparation  of  the  Great  Book  for  the 
perusal  of  the  world,  had  insensibly  restored  the  claims  of  that 
noisy  world  on  the  silent  individual.  And  therewith  came  a 
noble  remorse  that  he  had  hitherto  done  so  little  for  his 
species.  Was  it  enough  to  write  quartos  upon  the  past  his- 
tory of  Human  Error?  Was  it  not  his  duty,  when  the  occa- 
sion was  fairly  presented,  to  enter  upon  that  present,  daily, 
hourly  war  with  Error — which  is  the  sworn  chivalry  of  Knowl- 
edge ?  St.  George  did  not  dissect  dead  dragons,  he  fought  the 
live  one.  And  London,  with  that  magnetic  atmosphere  which 
in  greal  capitals  fills  the  breath  of  life  with  stimulating  parti- 
cles, had  its  share  in  quickening  the  slow  pulse  of  the  student. 
In  the  country, he  read  but  his  old  authors,  and  lived  with  them 
through  the  gone  ages.  In  the  city,  my  father,  during  the  in- 
tervals of  repose  from  the  Great  Book,  and  still  more  now  thai 
the  Greal  Book  had  come  to  a  pause,— inspected  the  literal  are 
of  his  own  time.  It  had  a  prodigious  effect  upon  him.  He 
was  unlike  the  ordinary  run  of  scholars,  and,  indeed,  of  readers 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  155 

for  that  matter — who,  in  their  superstitious  homage  to  the 
dead,  are  always  willing  enough  to  sacrifice  the  living.  He 
did  justice  to  the  marvellous  fertility  of  intellect  which  char- 
acterizes the  authorship  of  the  present  age.  By  the  present 
age,  I  do  not  only  mean  the  present  day,  I  commence  with  the 
century.  "  AYhat,"  said  my  father  one  day,  in  dispute  with 
Trevanion — "what  characterizes  the  literature  ofourtimeis — 
its  human  interest.  It  is  true  that  we  do  not  see  scholars  ad- 
dressing scholars,  but  men  addressing  men, — not  that  scholars 
are  fewer,  but  that  the  reading  public  is  more  large.  Authors 
in  all  ages  address  themselves  to  what  interests  their  readers ; 
the  same  things  do  not  interest  a  vast  community  which  inter- 
ested half  a  score  of  monks  or  book-worms.  The  literary  polls 
was  once  an.  oligarchy,  it  is  now  a  republic.  It  is  the  general 
brilliancy  of  the  atmosphere  which  prevents  your  noticing  the 
size  of  any  particular  star.  Do  you  not  see  that  with  the  cul- 
tivation of  the  masses  has  awakened  the  Literature  of  the 
affections  ?  Every  sentiment  finds  an  expositor,  every  feeling 
an  oracle.  Like  Epimenides,  I  have  been  sleeping  in  a  cave ; 
and,  waking,  I  see  those  whom  I  left  children  are  bearded 
men ;  and  towns  have  sprung  up  in  the  landscapes  which  I 
left  as  solitary  wastes." 

Thence  the  reader  may  perceive  the  causes  of  the  change 
which  had  come  other  my  father.  As  Robert  Hall  says,  I 
think  of  Dr.  Kippis,  "  he  had  laid  so  many  books  at  the  top  of 
his  head,  that  the  brains  could  not  move."  But  the  electricity 
had  now  penetrated  the  heart,  and  the  quickened  vigour  of  that 
noble  organ  enabled  the  brain  to  stir.  Meanwhile,  I  leave  my 
father  to  these  influences,  and  to  the  continuous  conversations 
of  Uncle  Jack,  and  proceed  with  the  thread  of  my  own  ego- 
tism. 

Thanks  to  Mr.  Trevanion,  my  habits  were  not  those  which 
favour  friendships  with  the  idle,  but  I  formed  some  acquaint- 
ances amongst  young  men  a  few  years  older  than  myself,  who 
held  subordinate  situations  in  public  ofiices,  or  were  keep- 
ing their  terms  for  the  bar.  There  was  no  want  of  ability 
amongst  these  gentlemen ;  but  they  had  not  yet  settled  into 
the  stern  prose  of  life.  Their  busy  hours  only  made  them 
more  disposed  to  enjoy  the  hours  of  relaxation.  And  when 
Ave  got  together,  a  very  gay,  light-hearted  set  we  were  !  We 
had  neither  money  enough  to  be  very  extravagant,  nor  leisure 


nil;   CAXTONS  : 

enough  t<>  be  very  dissipated;  but  we  amused  ourselves  not- 
withstanding. My  new  friends  were  wonderfully  erudite  in  all 
matters  connected  with  the  theatres.  From  an  opera  to  a  bal- 
let, from  Bamlel  to  the  last  farce  from  the  French,  they  had  the 
literature  of  the  stage  at  the  finger-ends  of  their  straw-colour- 
ed  gloves.  They  had  a  pretty  large  acquaintance  with  actors 
and  actresses,  and  were  perfect  Walpoluli  in  the  minor  scan- 
dals of  the  day.  To  do  them  justice,  however,  they  were  not 
indifferent  to  the  more  masculine  knowledge  necessary  in  "  this 
wrong  world."  They  talked  as  familiarly  of  the  real  actors  of 
life  as  of  the  sham  ones.  They  could  adjust  to  a  hair  the  rival 
pretensions  of  contending  statesmen.  They  did  not  profess  to 
be  deep  in  the  mysteries  of  foreign  cabinets  (with  the  excep- 
tion of  one  young  gentleman  connected  with  the  Foreign  Of- 
fice, who  prided  himself  on  knowing  exactly  what  the  Russians 
meant  to  do  with  India — when  they  got  it)  ;  but,  to  make 
amends,  the  majority  of  them  had  penetrated  the  closest  se- 
crets of  our  own.  It  is  true  that,  according  to  a  proper  sub- 
division of  labour,  each  took  some  particular  member  of  the 
government  for  his  special  observation ;  just  as  the  most  skil- 
ful surgeons,  however  profoundly  versed  in  the  general  struc- 
ture of  our  frame,  rest  their  anatomical  fame  on  the  light  they 
throw  on  particular  parts  of  it — one  man  taking  the  brain,  an- 
other the  duodenum,  a  third  the  spinal  cord,  while  a  fourth, 
perhaps,  is  a  master  of  all  the  symptoms  indicated  by  a  pensile 
finger.  Accordingly,  one  of  my  friends  appropriated  to  him- 
self the  Home  Department ;  another  the  Colonies ;  and  a  third, 
whom  we  all  regarded  as  a  future  Talleyrand  (or  a  De  Retz  at 
least),  had  devoted  himself  to  the  special  study  of  Sir  Robert 
Feel,  and  knew,  by  the  way  in  which  that  profound  and  in- 
scrutable statesman  threw  open  his  coat,  every  thought  that 
was  passing  in  his  breast!  Whether  lawyers  or  officials,  they 
all  had  a  great  idea  of  themselves — high  notions  of  what  they 
were  to  be,  rather  than  what  they  were  to  do,  some  day.  As 
the  king  of  modern  fine  gentlemen  said  of  himself,  in  para- 
phrase of  Voltaire,  "they  had  letters  in  their  pockets  address- 
ed to  Posterity — which  the  chances  were,  however,  that  they 
might  forget  to  deliver."  Somewhat  "  priggish"  most  of  them 
might  be;  but,  on  the  whole, they  were  far  more  interesting 
than  mere,  idle  men  Of  pleasure.  There  Mas  about  them,  as 
features  of  a  general  family  likeness,  a  redundant  activity  of 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  157 

life — a  gay  exuberance  of  ambition — a  light-hearted  earnest- 
ness when  at  work — a  schoolboy's  enjoyment  of  the  hours  of 
play. 

A  great  contrast  to  these  young  men  was  Sir  Sedley  Beau- 
desert,  who  was  pointedly  kind  to  me,  and  whose  bachelor's 
house  was  always  open  to  me  after  noon :  Sir  Sedley  was  vis- 
ible to  no  one  but  his  valet,  before  that  hour.  A  perfect  bach- 
elor's house  it  was,  too — with  its  windows  opening  on  the 
Park,  and  sofas  niched  into  the  windows,  on  which  you  might 
loll  at  your  ease,  like  the  philosopher  in  Lucretius, — 

"Despicere  unde  queas  alios,  passimque  videre, 
Errare," — 

and  see  the  gay  crowds  ride  to  and  fro  Eotten  Row — without 
the  fatigue  of  joining  them,  especially  if  the  wind  was  in  the 
east. 

There  was  no  affectation  of  costliness  about  the  rooms,  but 
a  wonderful  accumulation  of  comfort.  Every  patent  chair  that 
proffered  a  variety  in  the  art  of  lounging  found  its  place  there; 
and  near  every  chair  a  little  table,  on  which  you  might  deposit 
your  book  or  your  coffee-cup,  without  the  trouble  of  moving 
more  than  your  hand.  In  winter,  nothing  warmer  than  the 
quilted  curtains  and  Axminster  carpets  can  be  conceived.  In 
summer,  nothing  airier  and  cooler  than  the  muslin  draperies 
and  the  Indian  mattings.  And  I  defy  a  man  to  know  to  what 
perfection  dinner  may  be  brought,  unless  he  had  dined  with 
Sir  Sedley  Beaudesert.  Certainly,  if  that  distinguished  per- 
sonage had  but  been  an  egotist,  he  had  been  the  happiest  of 
men.  But,  unfortunately  for  him,  he  was  singularly  amiable 
and  kind-hearted.  He  had  the  bonne  digestion,  but  not  the 
other  requisite  for  worldly  felicity — the  mauvais  coeur.  He 
felt  a  sincere  pity  for  every  one  else  who  lived  in  rooms  with- 
out patent  chairs  and  little  coffee-tables — whose  windows  did 
not  look  on  the  Park,  with  sofas  niched  into  their  recesses.  As 
Henry  TV.  wished  every  man  to  have  his  pot  aufeu,  so  Sir  Sed- 
ley Beaudesert,  if  he  could  have  had  his  way,  would  have  ev- 
ery man  served  with  an  early  cucumber  for  his  fish,  and  a  ca- 
raffe  of  iced  water  by  the  side  of  his  bread  and  cheese.  He 
thus  evinced  on  politics  a  naive  simplicity,  which  delightfully 
contrasted  his  acuteness  on  matters  of  taste.  I  remember  his 
saying,  in  a  discussion  on  the  Beer  Bill,  "  The  poor  ought  not 
to  be  allowed  to  drink  beer,  it  is  so  particularly  rheumatic! 


158  THE    CAXTONSI 

The  besl  drink  in  hard  work  is  dry  champagne — (not  ?noits- 
A  use) — I  found  that  out  when  I  used  to  shoot  on  the  moors." 

Indolenl  as  Sir  Sedley  was, he  had  contrived  to  open  an  ex- 
traordinary number  of  drains  on  his  wealth. 

First,  as  a  landed  proprietor,  there  was  no  end  to  applica- 
tions from  distressed  farmers,  aged  poor,  benefit  societies,  and 
poachers  he  had  thrown  out  of  employment  by  giving  up  his 
preserves  to  please  his  tenants. 

Next,  as  a  man  of  pleasure,  the  whole  race  of  womankind 
had  Legitimate  demands  on  him.  From  a  distressed  duchess, 
whose  picture  \a,yperdu  under  a  secret  spring  of  his  snuff-box, 
to  a  decayed  laundress,  to  whom  he  might  have  paid  a  compli- 
ment on  the  perfect  involutions  of  a  frill,  it  was  quite  sufficient 
to  be  a  daughter  of  Eve  to  establish  a  just  claim  on  Sir  Sed- 
ley's  inheritance  from  Adam. 

Again,  as  an  amateur  of  art,  and  a  respectful  servant  of  every 
muse,  all  whom  the  public  had  failed  to  patronize — painter, 
actor,  poet,  musician — turned,  like  dying  sunflowers  to  the  sun, 
towards  the  pitying  smile  of  Sir  Sedley  Beaudesert.  Add  to 
these  the  general  miscellaneous  multitude,  who  "had  heard  of 
Sir  Sedley's  high  character  for  benevolence,"  and  one  may  well 
suppose  what  a  very  costly  reputation  he  had  set  up.  In  fact, 
though  Sir  Sedley  could  not  spend  on  what  might  fairly  be 
called  "himself,"  a  fifth  part  of  his  very  handsome  income,  I 
have  no  doubt  that  he  found  it  difficult  to  make  both  ends  meet 
at  the  close  of  the  year.  That  he  did  so,  he  owed  perhaps  to 
1  wo  rules  which  his  philosophy  had  peremptorily  adopted.  He 
never  made  debts,  and  he  never  gambled.  For  both  these  ad- 
mirable aberrations  from  the  ordinary  routine  of  line  gentle- 
men, I  believe  he  was  indebted  to  the  softness  of  his  disposi- 
tion, lie  had  a  great  compassion  for  a  wretch  who  was  dunned. 
"Poor  fellow!"  he  would  say,  "it  must  be  so  painful  to  him 
to  pass  his  life  in  Baying  No."  So  little  did  he  know  about 
that  class  ofpromisers — as  if  a  man  dunned  ever  said  No.  As 
Beau  Brummell,  when  asked  if  he  was  fond  of  vegetables,  own- 
ed that  he  had  once  eat  a  pea,  so  Sir  Sedley  Beaudesert  owned 
thai  li<-  had  once  played  high  at  piquet.  "I  was  so  unlucky 
a-  to  win,"  said  he,  referring  to  thai  indiscretion,  "and  I  shall 

never  forgel  the  anguish  on  the  face  of  the  man  who  paid  me. 
Cum—  I  could  always  lose,  il  would  be  a  perfect  purgatory  to 
play." 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  159 

Now  nothing  could  be  more  different  in  their  kinds  of  be- 
nevolence than  Sir  Sedley  and  Mr.  Trevanion.  Mi*.  Trevanion 
had  a  great  contempt  for  individual  charity.  He  rarely  put  his 
hand  into  his  purse — he  drew  a  great  check  on  his  bankers. 
Was  a  congregation  without  a  church,  or  a  village  without  a 
school,  or  a  river  without  a  bridge,  Mr.  Trevanion  set  to  work 
on  calculations,  found  out  the  exact  sum  required  by  an  alge- 
braic x — y,  and  paid  it  as  he  would  have  paid  his  butcher.  It 
must  be  owned  that  the  distress  of  a  man,  whom  he  allowed  to 
be  deserving,  did  not  appeal  to  him  in  vain.  But  it  is  aston- 
ishing how  little  he  spent  in  that  way ;  for  it  was  hard  indeed 
to  convince  Mr.  Trevanion  that  a  deserving  man  ever  was  in 
such  distress  as  to  want  charity.    - 

That  Trevanion,  nevertheless,  did  infinitely  more  real  good 
than  Sir  Sedley,  I  believe ;  but  he  did  it  as  a  mental  operation 
— by  no  means  as  an  impulse  from  the  heart.  I  am  sorry  to 
say  that  the  main  difference  was  this, — distress  always  seemed 
to  accumulate  round  Sir  Sedley,  and  vanish  from  the  presence 
of  Trevanion.  Where  the  last  came,  with  his  busy,  active, 
searching  mind,  energy  woke,  improvement  sprang  up.  "Where 
the  first  came,  with  his  warm  kind  heart,  a  kind  of  torpor  spread 
under  its  rays  ;  people  lay  down  and  basked  in  the  liberal  sun- 
shine. Nature  in  one  broke  forth  like  a  brisk  sturdy  winter, 
in  the  other  like  a  kizy  Italian  summer.  Winter  is  an  excel- 
lent invigorator,  no  doubt,  but  we  all  love  summer  better. 

Now,  it  is  a  proof  how  lovable  Sir  Sedley  was,  that  I  loved 
him,  and  yet  was  jealous  of  him.  Of  all  the  satellites  round 
my  fair  Cynthia,  Fanny  Trevanion,  I  dreaded  most  this  amiable 
luminary.  It  was  in  vain  for  me  to  say  with  the  insolence  of 
youth  that  Sir  Sedley  Beaudesert  was  of  the  same  age  as  Fan- 
ny's father ; — to  see  them  together,  he  might  have  passed  for 
Trevanion's  son.  No  one  amongst  the  younger  generation  was 
half  so  handsome  as  Sedley  Beaudesert.  He  might  be  eclipsed 
at  first  sight  by  the  showy  effect  of  more  redundant  locks  and 
more  brilliant  bloom ;  but  he  had  but  to  speak,  to  smile,  in  or- 
der to  throw  a  whole  cohort  of  dandies  into  the  shade.  It  was 
the  expression  of  his  countenance  that  was  so  bewitching; 
there  was  something  so  kindly  in  its  easy  candour,  its  benign 
good-nature.  And  he  understood  women  so  well!  He  flat- 
tered their  foibles  so  insensibly ;  he  commanded  their  affection 
with  so  gracious  a  dignity.     Above  all,  what  with  his  accom- 


1G0  THE   CAXTONS  : 

plishments,  his  peculiar  reputation,  Mb  long  celibacy,  and  the 
><>ti  melancholy  of  his  sentiments,  he  always  contrived  to  in- 
terest them.  There  was  nol  a  charming  woman  by  whom  this 
charming  man  did  nol  seem  just  on  the  point  of  being  caught! 
It  was  like  the  sighl  of  a  splendid  trout  in  a  transparent  stream, 
Bailing  pensively  to  and  fro  your  fly,  in  a  will-and-a-won't  sort 
of  way.  Such  a  trout!  it  would  be  a  thousand  pities  to  leave 
him,  when  evidently  so  well  disposed!  That  trout,  fair  maid 
or  gentle  widow,  would  have  kept  you — whipping  the  stream 
and  dragging  the  fly — from  morning  to  dewy  eve.  Certainly 
I  don't  wish  worse  to  my  bitterest  foe  of  iive-and-twenty  than 
Buch  a  rival  as  Sedley  Beaudesert  at  seven-and-forty. 

Fanny,  indeed,  perplexed  me  horribly.  Sometimes  I  fancied 
she  liked  me ;  but  the  fancy  scarce  thrilled  me  with  delight, 
before  it  vanished  in  the  frost  of  a  careless  look,  or  the  cold 
beam  of  a  sarcastic  laugh.  Spoiled  darling  of  the  world  as  she 
was  she  seemed  so  innocent  in  her  exuberant  happiness,  that 
one  forgot  all  her  faults  in  that  atmosphere  of  joy  which  she 
diffused  around  her.  And,  despite  her  pretty  insolence,  she 
had  so  kind  a  woman's  heart  below  the  surface!  When  she 
once  saw  that  she  had  pained  yrou,  she  was  so  soft,  so  winning, 
so  humble,  till  she  had  healed  the  wound.  But  theti,  if  she  saw 
she  had  pleased  you  too  much,  the  little  witch  was  never  easy 
till  she  had  plagued  you  again.  As  heiress  to  so  rich  a  father, 
or  rather  perhaps  mother  (for  the  fortune  came  from  Lady  El- 
linor),  she  was  naturally  surrounded  with  admirers  not  wholly 
disinterested.  She  did  right  to  plague  them — but  me  !  Poor 
boy  that  I  was,  why  should  I  seem  more  disinterested  than 
others  ?  how  should  she  perceive  all  that  lay  hid  in  my  young 
deep  heart  ?  Was  I  not  in  all  worldly  pretensions  the  least 
worthy  of  her  admirers,  and  might  I  not  seem,  therefore,  the 
most  mercenary?  I  who  never  thought  of  her  fortune,  or  if 
that  thought  did  come  across  me,  it  was  to  make  me  start  and 
turn  pale!  And  then  it  vanished  a1  her  first  glance,  as  a  ghost 
from  the  dawn.  How  hard  it  is  to  convince  youth,  that  sees 
all  the  world  of  the  future  before  it,  and  covers  that  future 
with  golden  palaces,  of  the  Inequalities  of  life!  In  my  fantastic 
and  sublime  romance,  I  looked  out  into  that  Great   Beyond, 

saw  myself  orator,  statesman,  minister,  ambassador — Heaven 
knows  what — laying  laurels,  which  I  mistook  for  rent-rolls,  at 
Fanny's  feet. 


A   FAMILY   PICTUKE.  161 

"Whatever  Fanny  might  have  discovered  as  to  the  state  of 
my  heart,  it  seemed  an  abyss  not  worth  prying  into  by  either 
Trevanion  or  Lady  Ellinor.  The  first,  indeed,  as  may  be  sup- 
posed, was  too  busy  to  think  of  such  trifles.  And  Lady  Ellinor 
treated  me  as  a  mere  boy — almost  like  a  boy  of  her  own,  she 
was  so  kind  to  me.  But  she  did  not  notice  much  the  things 
that  lay  immediately  around  her.  In  brilliant  conversation 
with  poets,  wits,  and  statesmen — in  sympathy  with  the  toils 
of  her  husband — or  proud  schemes  for  his  aggrandizement, 
Lady  Ellinor  lived  a  life  of  excitement.  Those  large  eager 
shining  eyes  of  hers,  bright  with  some  feverish  discontent, 
looked  far  abroad  as  if  for  new  worlds  to  conquer — the  world 
at  her  feet  escaped  from  her  vision.  She  loved  her  daughter, 
she  was  proud  of  her,  trusted  in  her  with  a  superb  repose — 
she  did  not  watch  over  her.  Lady  Ellinor  stood  alone  on  a 
mountain,  and  amidst  a  cloud. 


CHAPTER  II. 

Oxe  day  the  Trevanions  had  all  gone  into  the  country  on  a 
visit  to  a  retired  minister  distantly  related  to  Lady  Ellinor,  and 
who  was  one  of  the  few  persons  Trevanion  himself  condescend- 
ed to  consult.  I  had  almost  a  holiday.  I  went  to  call  on  Sir 
Sedley  Beaudesert. — I  had  always  longed  to  sound  him  on  one 
subject,  and  had  never  dared.  This  time  I  resolved  to  pluck 
up  courage. 

"  Ah,  my  young  friend  !"  said  he,  rising  from  the  contempla- 
tion of  a  villanous  picture  by  a  young  artist,  which  he  had  just 
benevolently  purchased,  "  I  was  thinking  of  you  this  morning. 
— Wait  a  moment,  Summers  (this  to  the  valet).  Be  so  good 
as  to  take  this  picture  ;  let  it  be  packed  up  and  go  down  into 
the  country.  It  is  a  sort  of  picture,"  he  added,  turning  to  me, 
"  that  requires  a  large  house.  I  have  an  old  gallery  with  little 
casements  that  let  in  no  light.  It  is  astonishing  how  conven- 
ient I  have  found  it !"  As  soon  as  the  picture  was  gone,  Sir 
Sedley  drew  a  long  breath,  as  if  relieved  ;  and  resumed  more 
gaily— 

"  Yes,  I  was  thinking  of  you ;  and  if  you  will  forgive  any  in- 
terference in  your  affairs — from  your  father's  old  friend — I 
should  be  greatly  honoured  by  your  permission  to  ask  Trevan- 


162  THE   iaxtons : 

ion  what  he  supposes  is  to  be  the  ultimate  benefit  of  the  horri- 
ble  labours  be  inflicts  upon  you." 

k>  But,  my  dear  Sir  Sedley,  Hike  the  labours  ;  I  am  perfectly 
contented." 

"Not  to  remain  always  secretary  to  one  who,  if  there  were 
no  business  to  be  done  among  men,  would  set  about  teaching 
the  ants  to  build  hills  upon  better  architectural  principles! 
My  dear  sir,  Trevanion  is  an  awful  man,  a  stupendous  man — 
one  catches  fatigue  if  one  is  in  the  same  room  with  him  three 
minutes!  At  your  age,  an  age  that  ought  to  be  so  happy," 
continued  Sir  Sedley,  with  a  compassion  perfectly  angelic,  "it 
is  -ad  to  see  so  little  enjoyment !" 

"lint,  Sir  Sedley,  I  assure  you  that  you  are  mistaken.  I 
thoroughly  enjoy  myself;  and  have  I  not  heard  even  you  con- 
fess that  one  may  be  idle  and  not  happy  ?" 

"  Itlid  not  confess  that  till  I  was  on  the  wrong  side  of  forty  !" 
said  Sir  Sedley,  with  a  slight  shade  on  his  brow. 

"  Nobody  would  ever  think  you  were  on  the  wrong  side  of 
forty!"  said  I,  with  artful  flattery,  winding  into  my  subject. 
"  Mi<s  Trevanion  for  instance  ?" 

I  paused.  Sir  Sedley  looked  hard  at  me,  from  his  bright 
dark-blue  eyes.     "  Well,  Miss  Trevanion  for  instance  ?" 

k>Mi-<  Trevanion,  who  has  all  the  best-looking  fellows  in 
London  round  her,  evidently  prefers  you  to  any  of  them." 

I  said  this  with  a  great  gulp.  I  was  absolutely  bent  on 
plumbing  the  depth  of  my  own  fears. 

Sir  Sedley  rose ;  he  laid  his  hand  kindly  on  mine,  and  said, 
"Do  not  let  Fanny  Trevanion  torment  you  even  more  than  her 
father  does!" 

"I  don't  understand  you,  Sir  Sedley!" 

"  Hut  if  I  understand  you,  that  is  more  to  the  purpose.  A 
girl  like  Mi<s  Trevanion  is  cruel  till  she  discovers  she  has  a 
heart.  It  is  not  safe  to  risk  one's  own  with  any  woman  till 
she  has  ceased  to  be  a  coquette.  My  dear  young  friend,  if  you 
1o.,k  life  less  in  earnest,  T  should  spare  you  the  pain  of  these 
hints.  Some  men  sow  flowers,  souk-  plan!  trees — you  are  plant- 
ing a  tree  under  which  you  will  soon  find  that  no  flower  will 
grow.  Well  and  good,  if  the  tree  could  lasl  to  bear  fruit  and 
give  shade;  but  beware  lest  you  have  to  tear  it  up  one  day  or 
Other  ;  for  then — what  then  ?  why  you  will  find  your  whole  life 
plucked  away  with  iis  roots !" 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  163 

Sir  Sedley  said  these  last  words  with  so  serious  an  emphasis, 
that  I  was  startled  from  the  confusion  I  had  felt  at  the  former 
part  of  his  address.  He  paused  long,  tapped  his  snuff-box,  in- 
haled a  pinch  slowly,  and  continued,  with  his  more  accustomed 
sprightliness : 

"Go  as  much  as  you  can  into  the  world — again  I  say  'enjoy 
yourself.'  And  again  I  ask,  what  is  all  this  labour  to  do  for 
you  ?  On  some  men,  far  less  eminent  than  Trevanion,  it  would 
impose  a  duty  to  aid  you  in  a  practical  career,  to  secure  you  a 
public  employment — not  so  on  him.  He  would  not  mortgage 
an  inch  of  his  independence  by  asking  a  favour  from  a  min- 
ister. He  so  thinks  occupation  the  delight  of  life,  that  he  oc- 
cupies you  out  of  pure  affection.  He  does  not  trouble  his  head 
about  your  future.  He  supposes  your  father  will  provide  for 
that,  and  does  not  consider  that  meanwhile  your  work  leads 
to  nothing!  Think  over  all  this.  I  have  now  bored  you 
enough." 

I  was  bewildered — I  was  dumb:  these  practical  men  of  the 
world,  how  they  take  us  by  surprise !  Here  had  I  come  to 
sound  Sir  Sedley,  and  here  was  I  plumbed,  gauged,  measured, 
turned  inside  out,  without  having  got  an  inch  beyond  the  sur- 
face of  that  smiling  debonnaire,  unruffled  ease.  Yet  with  his 
invariable  delicacy,  in  spite  of  all  this  horrible  frankness,  Sir 
Sedley  had  not  said  a  word  to  wound  what  he  might  think  the 
more  sensitive  part  of  my  amour  propre — not  a  word  as  to 
the  inadequacy  of  my  pretensions  to  think  seriously  of  Fanny 
Trevanion.  Had  we  been  the  Celadon  and  Chloe  of  a  country 
village,  he  could  not  have  regarded  us  as  more  equal,  so  far  as 
the  world  went.  And  for  the  rest,  he  rather  insinuated  that 
poor  Fanny,  the  great  heiress,  was  not  worthy  of  me,  than  that 
I  was  not  worthy  of  Fanny. 

I  felt  that  there  was  no  wisdom  in  stammering  and  blushing 
out  denials  and  equivocations ;  so  I  stretched  my  hand  to  Sir 
Sedley,  took  up  my  hat, — and  went.  Instinctively  I  bent  my 
way  to  my  father's  house.  I  had  not  been  there  for  many 
days.  Not  only  had  I  had  a  great  deal  to  do  in  the  way  of 
business,  but  I  am  ashamed  to  say  that  pleasure  itself  had  so 
entangled  my  leisure  hours,  and  Miss  Trevanion  especially  so 
absorbed  them,  that,  without  even  uneasy  foreboding,  I  had 
left  my  father  fluttering  his  wings  more  feebly  and  feebly  in 
the  web  of  Uncle  Jack.     When  I  arrived  in  Russell  Street,  I 


164  the  caxtons: 

found  the  fly  and  the  Bpider  eheek-by-jowl  together.  Uncle 
Jack  sprang  ap  al  my  entrance,  and  cried,  "Congratulate  your 
father.     Congratulate  him! — no;  congratulate  the  world!" 

"  What,  uncle!"  said  I,  with  a  dismal  effort  at  sympathizing 
liveliness, k>  is  the  'Literary  Times'  launched  at  last?" 

"<  Mi,  that  is  all  settled — settled  long  since.  Here's  a  speci- 
men of  the  type  we  have  chosen  for  the  leaders."  And  Uncle 
Jack,  whose  pocket  was  never  without  a  wet  sheet  of  some 
kind  or  other,  drew  forth  a  steaming  papyral  monster,  which 
in  point  of  size  was  to  the  political  "  Times"  as  a  mammoth 
may  be  to  an  elephant.  "That  is  all  settled.  We  are  only 
preparing  our  contributors,  and  shall  put  out  our  programme 
next  week  or  the  week  after.  No,  Pisistratus,  I  mean  the 
Great  Work." 

"  My  dear  father,  I  am  so  glad.  What !  it  is  really  sold, 
then  ?" 

"  Hum !"  said  my  father. 

"  Sold !"  burst  forth  Uncle  Jack.  "  Sold — no  sir,  we  would 
not  sell  it !  No :  if  all  the  booksellers  fell  down  on  their  knees 
to  us,  as  they  will  some  day,  that  book  should  not  be  sold ! 
Sir,  that  book  is  a  revolution — it  is  an  era — it  is  the  emanci- 
pator of  genius  from  mercenary  thraldom  ; — that  book  !" 

I  looked  inquiringly  from  uncle  to  father,  and  mentally  re- 
tracted my  congratulations.  Then  Mr.  Caxton,  slightly  blush- 
ing, and  shyly  rubbing  his  spectacles,  said,  "You  see,  Pisistra- 
tus, that  though  poor  Jack  has  devoted  uncommon  pains  to  in- 
duce the  publishers  to  recognize  the  merit  he  has  discovered  in 
the  '  History  of  Human  Error,'  he  has  failed  to  do  so." 

"  Not  a  bit  of  it ;  they  all  acknowledge  its  miraculous  learn- 
ing— its — " 

"  Very  true ;  but  they  don't  think  it  will  sell,  and  therefore 
most  selfishly  refuse  to  buy  it.  One  bookseller,  indeed,  offered 
to  treat  for  it  if  I  would  leave  out  all  about  the  Hottentots  and 
Caffres,  the  Greek  philosophers  and  Egyptian  priests,  and,  con- 
fining myself  solely  to  polite  society,  entitle  the  work  'Anec- 
dotes of  the  Courts  of  Europe,  ancient  and  modern.'" 

"The  wretch  !"  groaned  Uncle  Jack. 

"  Another  thought  it  might  be  cut  up  into  little  essays,  leav- 
ing out  the  quotations,  entitled  '  Men  and  Manners.'  A  third 
was  kind  enough  to  observe,  thai  though  this  particular  work 
v>:;~  quite  unsalable, yet, as  I  appeared  to  have  some  historical 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  165 

information,  he  should  be  happy  to  undertake  an  historical 
romance  from  '  my  graphic  pen' — that  was  the  phrase,  was  it 
not,  Jack?" 

Jack  was  too  full  to  speak. 

— "  Provided  I  would  introduce  a  proper  love-plot,  and  make 
it  into  three  volumes,  post  octavo,  twenty-three  lines  in  a  page, 
neither  more  nor  less.  One  honest  fellow  at  last  was  found, 
who  seemed  to  me  a  very  respectable  and  indeed  enterprising 
person.  And  after  going  through  a  list  of  calculations,  which 
showed  that  no  possible  profit  could  arise,  he  generously  offer- 
ed to  give  me  half  of  those  no-profits,  provided  I  would  guar- 
antee half  the  very  visible  expenses.  I  was  just  meditating 
the  prudence  of  accepting  this  proposal,  when  your  uncle  was 
seized  with  a  sublime  idea,  which  has  whisked  up  my  book  in 
a  whirlwind  of  expectation." 

"  And  that  idea  ?"  said  I,  despondingly. 

"  That  idea,"  quoth  Uncle  Jack,  recovering  himself,  "  is  sim- 
ply and  shortly  this.  From  time  immemorial,  authors  have 
been  the  prey  of  the  publishers.  Sir,  authors  have  lived  in 
garrets,  nay,  have  been  choked  in  the  street  by  an  unexpected 
crumb  of  bread,  like  the  man  who  wrote  the  play,  poor  fellow !" 

"Otway,"  said  my  father.  "The  story  is  not  true — no 
matter." 

"  Milton,  sir,  as  everybody  knows,  sold  '  Paradise  Lost'  for 
ten  pounds — ten  pounds,  sir !  In  short,  instances  of  a  like  na- 
ture are  too  numerous  to  quote.  But  the  booksellers,  sir — 
they  are  leviathans — they  roll  in  seas  of  gold.  They  subsist 
upon  authors  as  vampires  upon  little  children.  But  at  last  en- 
durance has  reached  its  limit — the  fiat  has  gone  forth — the 
tocsin  of  liberty  has  resounded — authors  have  burst  their  fet- 
ters. And  we  have  just  inaugurated  the  institution  of '  The 
Graxd  axti-Publisher  Confederate  Authors'  Society,' 
by  which,  Pisistratus — by  which,  mark  you,  every  author  is 
to  be  his  own  publisher — that  is,  every  author  who  joins  the 
Society.  No  more  submission  of  immortal  works  to  merce- 
nary calculators,  to  sordid  tastes — no  more  hard  bargains  and 
broken  hearts ! — no  more  crumbs  of  bread  choking  great  tragic 
poets  in  the  streets — no  more  Paradises  Lost  sold  at  £10 
a-piece !  The  author  brings  his  book  to  a  select  committee 
appointed  for  the  purpose;  men  of  delicacy,  education,  and 
refinement — authors  themselves ;  they  read  it,  the  Society  pub- 


166  i  BE  <  whins  : 

Lish;  and  after  a  modest  deduction,  which  goes  toward  the 
funds  of  the  Society,  the  Treasurer  hands  over  the  profits  to 
the  author." 

'•s<.  iliat,  iii  fact,  Uncle,  every  author  who  can't  find  a  pub- 
lisher anywhere  else,  will  of  course  come  to  the  Society.  The 
fraternity  will  be  numerous. 

-  It  will  indeed.1' 

"And  the  speculation — ruinous." 

-  Ruinous,  why?" 

kv  Because,  in  all  mercantile  negotiations,  it  is  ruinous  to  in- 
vest capital  in  supplies  which  fail  of  demand.  You  undertake 
to  publish  books  that  booksellers  will  not  publish — why  ?  be- 
cause booksellers  can't  sell  them!  It  is  just  probable  that 
you'll  not  sell  them  any  better  than  the  booksellers.  Ergo, 
the  more  your  business,  the  larger  your  deficit ;  and  the  more 
numerous  your  society,  the  more  disastrous  your  condition. 

Q.E.D." 

"  Pooh !  The  select  committee  will  decide-  what  books  are 
to  be  published." 

"  Then,  where  the  deuce  is  the  advantage  to  the  authors ! 
I  would  as  lief  submit  my  work  to  a  publisher  as  I  would  to 
a  select  committee  of  authors.  At  all  events,  the  publisher  is 
not  my  rival ;  and  I  suspect  he  is  the  best  judge,  after  all,  of  a 
book — as  an  accoucheur  ought  to  be  of  a  baby." 

"Upon  my  word,  nephew,  you  pay  a  bad  compliment  to 
your  father's  Great  Work,  which  the  booksellers  will  have 
nothing  to  do  with." 

That  was  artfully  said,  and  I  was  posed :  when  Mr.  Caxton 
observed,  with  an  apologetic  smile, 

"The  met  is,  my  dear  Pisistratus,  that  I  want  my  book 
published  without  diminishing  the  little  fortune  I  keep  for  you 
some  day.  Uncle  Jack  starts  a  society  to  publish  it. — Health 
and  long  life  to  Uncle  Jack's  society.  One  can't  look  a  gift 
horse  in  the  mouth." 

line  my  mother  entered,  rosy  from  a  shopping  expedition 
with  Mrs.  Primmins ;  and  in  her  joy  at  hearing  that  I  could 
stay  dinner,  all  else  was  forgotten.  By  a  wonder,  which  I  did 
not  regret,  Uncle  Jack  really  was  engaged  to  dine  out.  He 
had  other  irons  in  the  fire  besides  the  "Literary  Times"  and 
the  "  Confederate  Authors'  Society  ;"  he  was  deep  in  a  scheme 
for  making  house-tops  of  hit  (which,  under  other  hands,  has, 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  167 

I  believe,  since  succeeded) ;  and  he  had  found  a  rich  man  (I 
suppose  a  hatter)  who  seemed  well  inclined  to  the  project,  and 
had  actually  asked  him  to  dine  and  expound  his  Aiews. 


CHAPTER  ni. 

Here  we  three  are  seated  round  the  open  window — after 
dinner — familiar  as  in  the  old  happy  time — and  my  mother  is 
talking  low,  that  she  may  not  disturb  my  father,  who  seems 
in  thought. — 

Cr-cr-crrr-cr-cr !  I  feel  it — I  have  it. — Where !  What ! 
Where!  Knock  it  down — brush  it  off!  For  Heaven's  sake, 
see  to  it! — Crrrr-crrrrr — there — here — in  my  hair  —  in  my 
sleeve — in  my  ear. — Cr-cr. 

I  say  solemnly,  and  on  the  word  of  a  Christian,  that,  as  I 
sat  down  to  begin  this  chapter,  being  somewhat  in  a  brown 
study,  the  pen  insensibly  slipt  from  my  hand,  and,  leaning- 
back  in  my  chair,  I  fell  to  gazing  into  the  fire.  It  is  the  end 
of  June,  and  a  remarkably  cold  evening — even  for  that  time 
of  year.  And  while  I  was  so  gazing  I  felt  something  crawling 
just  by  the  nape  of  the  neck,  ma'am.  Instinctively  and  me- 
chanically, and  still  musing,  I  put  my  hand  there,  and  drew 
forth — What  ?  That  what  it  is  which  perplexes  me.  It  was 
a  thing — a  dark  thing — a  much  bigger  thing  than  I  had  ex- 
pected. And  the  sight  took  me  so  by  surprise,  that  I  gave 
my  hand  a  violent  shake,  and  the  thing  went — where  I  know 
not.  The  what  and  the  where  are  the  knotty  points  in  the 
whole  question  !  Xo  sooner  had  it  gone,  than  I  was  seized 
with  repentance  not  to  have  examined  it  more  closely — not  to 
have  ascertained  what  the  creature  was.  It  might  have  been 
an  earwig — a  very  large  motherly  earwig — an  earwig  far  gone 
in  that  way  in  which  earwigs  wish  to  be  who  love  their  lords. 
I  have  a  profound  horror  of  earwigs — I  firmly  believe  that  they 
do  get  into  the  ear.  That  is  a  subject  upon  which  it  is  use- 
less to  argue  with  me  upon  philosophical  grounds.  I  have  a 
vivid  recollection  of  a  story  told  me  by  Mrs.  Primmins — How 
a  lady  for  many  years  suffered  under  the  most  excruciating 
headaches ;  how,  as  the  tombstones  say,  "  physicians  were  in 
vain ;"  how  she  died ;  and  how  her  head  was  opened,  and  how 
such  a  nest  of  earwigs — ma'am — such  a  nest ! — Earwigs  are 


168  i  in:  i axtons: 

the  prolifickesl  of  things,  and  so  fond  of  their  offspring!  They 
Bit  on  their  eggs  like  Inns — and  the  young,  as  soon  as  they  are 
born,  creep  under  them  for  protection — quite  touchingly !  Im- 
agine such  an  establishment  domesticated  at  one's  tympanum ! 
But  the  creature  was  certainly  larger  than  an  earwig.  It 
might  have  been  one  of  that  genus  in  the  family  of  ForficuMdoB, 
called  Labidoura — monsters  whose  antennae  have  thirty  joints! 
There  is  a  species  of  this  creature  in  England,  but,  to  the  great 
grief  of  naturalists,  and  to  the  great  honour  of  Providence,  very 
rarely  found,  infinitely  larger  than  the  common  earwig,  or  For- 
ficulida  auriculana.  Could  it  have  been  an  early  hornet?  It 
had  certainly  a  black  head  and  great  feelers.  I  have  a  greater 
horror  of  hornets,  if  possible,  than  I  have  of  earwigs.  Two 
hornets  will  kill  a  man,  and  three  a  carriage-horse  sixteen  hands 
high.  However,  the  creature  was  gone. — Yes, but  where? 
Where  had  I  so  rashly  thrown  it  ?  It  might  have  got  into  a 
fold  of  my  dressing-gown  or  into  my  slippers — or,  in  short, 
anywhere  in  the  various  recesses  for  earwigs  and  hornets  which 
a  gentleman's  habiliments  afford.  I  satisfy  myself  at  last,  as 
far  as  I  can,  seeing  that  I  am  not  alone  in  the  room — that  it  is 
not  upon  me.  I  look  upon  the  carpet — the  rug — the  chair — 
under  the  fender.  It  is  non  inventus.  I  barbarously  hope  it 
is  frizzing  behind  that  great  black  coal  in  the  grate.  I  pluck 
up  courage — I  prudently  remove  to  the  other  end  of  the  room. 
I  take  up  my  pen — I  begin  my  chapter — very  nicely,  too,  I 
think  upon  the  whole.  I  am  just  getting  into  my  subject,  when 
—  cr-cr-cr-cr-cr — crawl — crawl — crawl — creep — creep — creep. 
Exactly,  my  dear  ma'am,  in  the  same  place  it  was  before  !  Oh, 
by  the  Powers!  I  forgot  all  my  scientific  regrets  at  not  hav- 
ing scrutinized  its  genus  before,  whether  Forficulida  or  Labi- 
doura. I  made  a  desperate  lunge  with  both  hands — something 
between  thrust  and  cut,  ma'am.  The  beast  is  gone.  Yes,  but 
again  where  ?  I  say  that  that  inhere  is  a  very  horrible  ques- 
lion.  Saving  come  twice,  in  spite  of  all  my  precautions — and 
exactly  on  the  same  spot,  too — it  shows  a  confirmed  disposi- 
tion to  habituate  itself  to  its  quarters — to  effect  a  parochial  set- 
tlement upon  me;  there  is  something  awful  and  preternatural 
in  it.  I  assure  you  that  there  is  not  a  part  of  me  that  has  not 
-one  cr-cr-cr! — that  has  not  crept — crawled  and  forficulated 
ever  since;  and  I  put  it  t<>  you  what  sort  of  a  chapter  I  can 
make  after  such  a — My  good  little  girl,  will  you  just  take  the 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  169 

candle,  and  look  carefully  under  the  table  ? — that's  a  dear ! 
Yes,  my  love,  very  black  indeed,  with  two  horns,  and  inclined 
to  be  corpulent.  Gentlemen  and  ladies  who  have  cultivated 
an  acquaintance  with  the  Phoenician  language,  are  aware  that 
Belzebub,  examined  etymologically  and  entomologically,  is  noth- 
ing more  nor  less  than  Baalzebub — "  the  Jupiter-fly" — an  em- 
blem of  the  Destroying  Attribute,  which  attribute,  indeed,  is 
found  in  all  the  insect  tribes  more  or  less.  Wherefore,  as  Mr. 
Payne  Knight,  in  his  Inquiry  into  Symbolical  Languages,  hath 
observed,  the  Egyptian  priests  shaved  their  whole  bodies,  even 
to  their  eyebrows,  lest  unaware  they  should  harbour  any  of  the 
minor  Zebubs  of  the  great  Baal.  If  I  were  the  least  bit  more 
persuaded  that  that  black  cr-cr  were  about  me  still,  and  that 
the  sacrifice  of  my  eyebrows  would  deprive  him  of  shelter,  by 
the  souls  of  the  Ptolemies  !  I  would, — and  I  will,  too.  Ring 
the  bell,  my  little  dear !  John,  my — my  cigar-box !  There  is 
not  a  cr  in  the  world  that  can  abide  the  fumes  of  the  Havan- 
nah !  Pshaw !  sir,  I  am  not  the  only  man  who  lets  his  first 
thoughts  upon  cold  steel  end,  like  this  chapter,  in — Pfl- — pff — 
pff—! 


CHAPTER  IV. 

Everything  in  this  world  is  of  use,  even  a  black  thing  crawl- 
ing over  the  nape  of  one's  neck!  Grim  unknown!  I  shall 
make  of  thee — a  simile ! 

I  think,  ma'am,  you  will  allow  that  if  an  incident  such  as  I 
have  described  had  befallen  yourself,  and  you  had  a  proper  and 
lady-like  horror  of  earwigs  (however  motherly  and  fond  of  their 
offspring),  and  also  of  early  hornets, — and  indeed  of  all  unknown 
things  of  the  insect  tribe  with  black  heads  and  two  great  horns, 
or  feelers,  or  forceps,  just  by  your  ear — I  think,  ma'am,  you 
will  allow  that  you  would  find  it  difficult  to  settle  back  to  your 
former  placidity  of  mood  and  innocent  stitch-work.  You  would 
feel  a  something  that  grated  on  your  nerves — and  cr'd-cr'd  "  all 
over  you  like,"  as  the  children  say.  And  the  worst  of  it  is, 
that  you  would  be  ashamed  to  say  it.  You  would  feel  obliged 
to  look  pleased  and  join  in  the  conversation,  and  not  fidget  too 
much,  nor  always  be  shaking  your  flounces,  and  looking  into  a 
dark  corner  of  your  apron.     Thus  it  is  with  many  other  things 

H 


L70  Tin:  <w  i"\s  : 

in  life  besides  black  insects.  One  has  a  Becrel  care — an  ab- 
straction— a  something  between  the  memory  and  the  feeling, 
of  a  dark  crawling  cr,  which  one  lias  never  dared  to  analyze. 
So  I  sal  by  my  mother,  trying  to  smile  and  talk  as  in  the  old 
time, — bnl  longing  to  move  about  and  look  around,  and  escape 
to  my  own  solitude,  and  take  the  clothes  off  my  mind,  and  sec 
-what  it  was  that  had  so  troubled  and  terrified  me — for  trouble 
and  terror  were  upon  me.  And  my  mother,  who  was  always 
(heaven  bless  her !)  inquisitive  enough  in  all  that  concerned  her 
darling  Anachronism,  was  especially  inquisitive  that  evening. 
She  made  me  say  where  I  had  been,  and  what  I  had  done,  and 
how  I  had  spent  my  time, — and  Fanny  Trevanion  (whom  she 
1 1  ad  seen,  by  the  way,  three  or  four  times,  and  whom  she  thought 
the  prettiest  person  in  the  world) — oh,  she  must  know  exactly 
what  I  thought  of  Fanny  Trevanion ! 

And  all  this  while  my  father  seemed  in  thought ;  and  so, 
with  my  arm  over  my  mother's  chair,  and  my  hand  in  hers,  I 
answered  my  mother's  questions — sometimes  by  a  stammer, 
sometimes  by  a  violent  effort  at  volubility ;  when  at  some  in- 
terrogatory that  went  tingling  right  to  my  heart,  I  turned  un- 
easily, and  there  were  my  father's  eyes  fixed  on  mine — fixed  as 
they  had  been — when,  and  none  knew  why,  I  pined  and  lan- 
guished, and  my  father  said  "  he  must  go  to  school."  Fixed, 
with  quiet  watchful  tenderness.  Ah  no ! — his  thoughts  had 
not  been  on  the  Great  Work — he  had  been  deep  in  the  pages 
of  that  less  worthy  one  for  which  he  had  yet  more  an  author's 
paternal  care.  I  met  those  eyes,  and  yearned  to  throw  my- 
self on  his  heart — and  tell  him  all.  Tell  him  what  ?  Ma'am, 
I  no  more  knew  what  to  tell  him,  than  I  know  what  that 
black  thing  was  which  has  so  worried  me  all  this  blessed 
evening ! 

" Pisistratus,"  said  my  father,  softly,  "I  fear  you  have  for- 
gotten the  saffron  bag." 

"  Xo,  indeed,  sir,"  said  I,  smiling. 

"He,"  resumed  my  father, — "he  who  wears  the  saffron  bag 
has  more  cheerful,  settled  spirits  than  you  seem  to  have,  my 
poor  boy." 

"My  dear  Austin,  his  spirits  are  very  good,  I  think,"  said 
my  mother,  anxiously. 

My  father  shook  his  head — then  he  took  two  or  three  turns 
about  the  room. 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  171 

"  Shall  I  ring  for  candles,  sir  ?  It  is  getting  dark  :  you  will 
wish  to  read  ?" 

"  No,  Pisistratus,  it  is  you  who  shall  read  ;  and  this  hour  of 
twilight  best  suits  the  book  I  am  about  to  open  to  you." 

So  saying,  he  drew  a  chair  between  me  and  my  mother,  and 
seated  himself  gravely,  looking  down  a  long  time  in  silence — 
then  turning  his  eyes  to  each  of  us  alternately. 

"My  dear  wife,"  said  he,  at  length,  almost  solemnly,  "I  am 
going  to  speak  of  myself  as  I  was  before  I  knew  you." 

Even  in  the  twilight  I  saw  that  my  mother's  countenance 
changed. 

"  You  have  respected  my  secrets,  Katherine,  tenderly — hon- 
estly. Now  the  time  is  come  when  I  can  tell  them  to  you  and 
to  our  son." 


CHAPTER  V. 

MY   FATHER'S    FIRST   LOVE. 

"  I  lost  my  mother  early  ;  my  father  (a  good  man,  but  who 
was  so  indolent  that  he  rarely  stirred  from  his  chair,  and  who 
often  passed  whole  days  without  speaking,  like  an  Indian  del- 
vish)  left  Roland  and  myself  to  educate  ourselves  much  accord- 
ing to  our  own  tastes.  Roland  shot,  and  hunted,  and  fished, 
— read  all  the  poetry  and  books  of  chivalry  to  be  found  in  my 
father's  collection,  which  was  rich  in  such  matters,  and  made  a 
great  many  copies  of  the  old  pedigree ; — the  only  thing  in 
which  my  father  ever  evinced  much  vital  interest.  Early  in 
life  I  conceived  a  passion  for  graver  studies,  and  by  good  luck 
I  found  a  tutor  in  Mr.  Tibbets,  who,  but  for  his  modesty,  Kitty, 
would  have  rivalled  Porson.  He  was  a  second  Budreus  for  in- 
dustry, and  by  the  way,  he  said  exactly  the  same  thing  that 
Budreus  did,  viz., '  that  the  only  lost  day  in  his  life  was  that  in 
which  he  was  married ;  for  on  that  day  he  had  only  had  six 
hours  for  reading !'  Under  such  a  master  I  could  not  fail  to 
be  a  scholar.  I  came  from  the  university  with  such  distinction 
as  led  me  to  look  sanguinely  on  my  career  in  the  world. 

"  I  returned  to  my  father's  quiet  rectory  to  pause  and  con- 
sider what  path  I  should  take  to  fame.  The  rectory  was  just 
at  the  foot  of  the  hill,  on  the  brow  of  which  were  the  ruins  of 
the  castle  Roland  has  since  purchased.     And  though  I  did  not 


1  ,-J  THE    CAXTONS: 

feel  for  the  ruins  the  Bame  romantic  veneration  as  my  dear 
brother  (for  my  day-dreams  were  more  coloured  by  classic 
than  feudal  recollections),  yet  I  loved  to  climb  the  hill,  book  in 
hand,  and  built  my  castles  in  the  air  amidst  the  wrecks  of  that 
which  time  had  shattered  on  the  earth. 

u(  me  day,  entering  the  old  weed-grown  court,  I  saw  a  lady 
Beated  on  my  favourite  spot,  sketching  the  ruins.  The  lady 
was  young — more  beautiful  than  any  woman  I  had  yet  seen,  at 
least  to  my  eyes.  In  a  word,  I  was  fascinated,  and,  as  the  trite 
phrase  goes,  '  spell-bound.'  I  seated  myself  at  a  little  distance, 
and  contemplated  her  without  desiring  to  speak.  By-and-by, 
from  another  part  of  the  ruins,  which  were  then  uninhabited, 
came  a  tall,  imposing,  elderly  gentleman,  with  a  benignant  as- 
pect ;  and  a  little  dog.  The  dog  ran  up  to  me  barking.  This 
drew  the  attention  of  both  lady  and  gentleman  to  me.  The 
gentleman  approached,  called  off  the  dog,  and  apologized  with 
much  politeness.  Surveying  me  somewhat  curiously,  he  then 
began  to  ask  questions  about  the  old  place  and  the  family  it 
had  belonged  to,  with  the  name  and  antecedents  of  which  he 
was  well  acquainted.  By  degrees  it  came  out  that  I  was  the 
descendant  of  that  family,  and  the  younger  son  of  the  humble 
rector  who  was  now  its  representative.  The  gentleman  then 
introduced  himself  to  me  as  the  Earl  of  Rainsforth,  the  princi- 
pal proprietor  in  the  neighbourhood,  but  who  had  so  rarely 
visited  the  county  during  my  childhood  and  earlier  youth,  that 
I  had  never  before  seen  him.  His  only  son,  however,  a  young 
man  of  great  promise,  had  been  at  the  same  college  with  me  in 
my  first  year  at  the  university.  The  young  lord  was  a  reading 
man  and  a  scholar ;  and  we  had  become  slightly  acquainted 
when  he  left  for  his  travels. 

"  Now,  on  hearing  my  name,  Lord  Rainsforth  took  my  hand 
cordially,  and,  leading  me  to  his  daughter,  said,  '  Think,  Elli- 
nor,  how  fortunate ! — this  is  the  Mr.  Caxton  whom  your  broth- 
er bo  often  spoke  of.' 

"In  short,  my  dear  Pisistratus,  the  ice  was  broken,  the  ac- 
quaintance made,  and  Lord  Rainsforth,  saying  he  was  come  to 
atone  for  his  long  absence  from  the  county,  and  to  reside  at 
Compton  th<'  greater  pari  of  the  year,  pressed  me  to  visit  him. 
I  did  so.  Lord  Rainsforth'e  liking  to  me  increased:  I  went 
there  often." 

M  \  Jitlr  i  paused,  and  seeing  my  mother  had  fixed  her  eyes 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  1*73 

upon  him  with  a  sort  of  mournful  earnestness,  and  had  pressed 
her  hands  very  tightly  together,  he  bent  down  and  kissed  her 
forehead. 

"  There  is  no  cause,  my  child !"  said  he.  It  was  the  only 
time  I  ever  heard  him  address  my  mother  so  parentally.  But 
then  I  never  heard  him  before  so  grave  and  solemn — not  a 
quotation,  too — it  was  incredible  :  it  was  not  my  father  speak- 
ing, it  was  another  man.  "  Yes,  I  went  there  often.  Lord 
Rainsforth  was  a  remarkable  person.  Shyness  that  was  whol- 
ly without  pride  (which  is  rare),  and  a  love  for  quiet  literary 
pursuits,  had  prevented  his  taking  that  personal  part  in  public 
life  for  which  he  was  richly  qualified ;  but  his  reputation  for 
sense  and  honour,  and  his  personal  popularity,  had  given  him 
no  inconsiderable  influence  even,  I  believe,  in  the  formation  of 
cabinets,  and  he  had  once  been  prevailed  upon  to  fill  a  high 
diplomatic  situation  abroad,  in  which  I  have  no  doubt  that  he 
was  as  miserable  as  a  good  man  can  be  under  any  infliction. 
He  was  now  pleased  to  retire  from  the  world,  and  look  at  it 
through  the  loopholes  of  retreat.  Lord  Rainsforth  had  a  great 
respect  for  talent,  and  a  warm  interest  in  such  of  the  young  as 
seemed  to  him  to  possess  it.  By  talent,  indeed,  his  family  had 
risen,  and  were  strikingly  characterized.  His  ancestor,  the 
first  peer,  had  been  a  distinguished  lawyer ;  his  father  had 
been  celebrated  for  scientific  attainments  ;  his  children,  Ellinor 
and  Lord  Pendarvis,  were  highly  accomplished.  Thus  the 
family  identified  themselves  with  the  aristocracy  of  intellect, 
and  seemed  unconscious  of  their  claims  to  the  lower  aristoc- 
racy of  rank.  You  must  bear  this  in  mind  throughout  my 
story. 

"  Lady  Ellinor  shared  her  father's  tastes  and  habits  of 
thought — (she  was  not  then  an  heiress).  Lord  Rainsforth 
talked  to  me  of  my  career.  It  was  a  time  when  the  French 
Revolution  had  made  statesmen  look  round  with  some  anxiety 
to  strengthen  the  existing  order  of  things,  by  alliance  with  all 
in  the  rising  generation  who  evinced  such  ability  as  might  in- 
fluence their  contemporaries. 

"  University  distinction  is,  or  was  formerly,  among  the  pop- 
ular passports  to  public  life.  By  degrees,  Lord  Rainsforth 
liked  me  so  well  as  to  suggest  to  me  a  seat  in  the  House  of 
Commons.  A  member  of  Parliament  might  rise  to  anything, 
and  Lord  Rainsforth  had  sufficient  influence  to  effect  my  re- 


17  t  THE   CAXTONS  ! 

tarn.  Dazzling  prospect  this  to  a  young  scholar  fresh  from 
Thucydides,  and  with  Demosthenes  fresh  at  his  tongue's  end. 
My  dear  boy,  I  was  not  then,  you  see,  quite  what  I  am  now  ; 
in  a  word,  I  loved  Ellinor  Compton,  and  therefore  I  was  ambi- 
tious. Sou  know  how  ambitious  she  is  still.  But  I  could  not 
mould  my  ambition  to  hers.  I  could  not  contemplate  entering 
the  senate  of  my  country  as  a  dependant  on  a  party  or  a  pa- 
tron— as  a  man  who  must  make  his  fortune  there — as  a  man 
who,  in  every  vote,  must  consider  how  much  nearer  he  ad- 
vanced himself  to  emolument.  I  was  not  even  certain  that 
Lord  Rainsforth's  views  on  politics  were  the  same  as  mine 
would  be.  How  could  the  politics  of  an  experienced  man  of 
the  world  be  those  of  an  ardent  young  student  ?  But  had 
they  been  identical,  I  felt  that  I  could  not  so  creep  into  equal- 
ity with  a  patron's  daughter.  Xo !  I  was  ready  to  abandon 
my  own  more  scholastic  predilections — to  strain  every  energy 
at  the  bar — to  carve  or  force  my  own  way  to  fortune — and  if  I 
arrived  at  independence,  then — what  then?  why,  the  right  to 
speak  of  love,  and  aim  at  power.  This  was  not  the  view  of 
Ellinor  Compton.  The  law  seemed  to  her  a  tedious,  needless 
drudgery :  there  was  nothing  in  it  to  captivate  her  imagina- 
tion. She  listened  to  me  with  that  charm  which  she  yet  re- 
tains, and  by  which  she  seems  to  identify  herself  with  those 
who  speak  to  her.  She  would  turn  to  me  with  a  pleading 
look  when  her  father  dilated  on  the  brilliant  prospects  of  a 
parliamentary  success;  for  he  (not  having  gained  it,  yet  hav- 
ing lived  with  those  who  had)  overvalued  it,  and  seemed  ever 
to  wish  to  enjoy  it  through  some  other.  But  when  I,  in  turn, 
spoke  of  independence,  of  the  bar,  Ellinor's  face  grew  overcast. 
The  world — the  world  was  with  her,  and  the  ambition  of  the 
world,  which  is  always  for  power  or  effect !  A  part  of  the 
house  lay  exposed  to  the  east  wind.  'Plant  half-way  down 
the  hill,'  said  I,  one  day.  *  Plant !'  cried  Lady  Ellinor — '  it  will 
be  twenty  years  before  the  trees  grow  up.  No,  my  dear  fa- 
ther,  build  a  wall,  and  cover  it  with  creepers!'  That  was  an 
illustration  of  her  whole  character.  She  could  not  wait  till 
trees  had  time  to  grow  ;  a  dead  wall  would  be  so  much  more 
quickly  thrown  up,  and  parasite  creepers  would  give  it  a  pret- 
tier effect.  Nevertheless,  she  was  :i  grand  and  noble  creature. 
And  I — in  love!  Not  so  discouraged  as  you  may  suppose ; 
for  Lord  Rainsforth  often  hinted  encouragement,  which  even  I 


A   FAMILY   PICTUBE.  175 

could  scarcely  misconstrue.  Not  caring  for  rank,  and  not 
wishing  for  fortune  beyond  competence  for  his  daughter,  he 
saw  in  me  all  he  required — a  gentleman  of  ancient  birth,  and 
one  in  whom  his  own  active  mind  could  prosecute  that  kind 
of  mental  ambition  which  overflowed  in  him,  and  yet  had 
never  had  its  vent.  And  Ellinor ! — Heaven  forbid  I  should 
say  she  loved  me, — but  something  made  me  think  she  could 
do  so.  Under  these  notions,  suppressing  all  my  hopes,  I  made 
a  bold  effort  to  master  the  influences  round  me,  and  to  adopt 
that  career  I  thought  worthiest  of  us  all.  I  went  to  London 
to  read  for  the  bar." 

"  The  bar !  is  it  possible  ?"  cried  I.    My  father  smiled  sadly. 

"Everything  seemed  possible  to  me  then.  I  read  some 
months.  I  began  to  see  my  way  even  in  that  short  time ;  be- 
gan to  comprehend  what  would  be  the  difficulties  before  me, 
and  to  feel  there  was  that  within  me  which  could  master  them. 
I  took  a  holiday  and  returned  to  Cumberland.  I  found  Roland 
there  on  my  return.  Always  of  a  roving,  adventurous  temper, 
though  he  had  not  then  entered  the  army,  he  had,  for  more 
than  two  years,  been  wandering  over  Great  Britain  and  Ire- 
land on  foot.  It  was  a  young  knight-errant  whom  I  embraced, 
and  who  overwhelmed  me  with  reproaches  that  I  should  be 
reading  for  the  law.  There  had  never  been  a  lawyer  in  the 
family  !  It  was  about  that  time,  I  think,  that  I  petrified  him 
with  the  discovery  of  the  printer  !  I  knew  not  exactly  where- 
fore, whether  from  jealousy,  fear,  foreboding — but  it  certainly 
was  a  pain  that  seized  me — when  I  learned  from  Roland  that 
he  had  become  intimate  at  Compton  Hall.  Roland  and  Lord 
Rainsforth  had  met  at  the  house  of  a  neighbouring  gentleman, 
and  Lord  Rainsforth  had  welcomed  his  acquaintance,  at  first, 
perhaps,  for  my  sake,  afterwards  for  his  own. 

"  I  could  not  for  the  life  of  me,"  continued  my  father,  "  ask 
Roland  if  he  admired  Ellinor ;  but  when  I  found  that  he  did 
not  put  that  question  to  me,  I  trembled ! 

"  We  went  to  Compton  together,  speaking  little  by  the  way. 
We  stayed  there  some  days." 

My  father  here  thrust  his  hand  into  his  waistcoat — all  men 
have  their  little  ways,  which  denote  much ;  and  when  my  fa- 
ther thrust  his  hand  into  his  waistcoat,  it  was  always  a  sign  of 
some  mental  effort — he  was  going  to  prove,  or  to  argue,  to 
moralize,  or  to  preach.     Therefore,  though  I  was  listening  be- 


L76  i  m:  (  axtoxs 


Pore  with  all  my  oars,  T  believe  I  had,  speaking  magnetically 
and  me8merically,  an  extra  pair  of  ears,  a  new  sense  supplied  to 
me,  when  my  father  put  his  hand  into  his  waistcoat. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

WHEREIN    MY   FATHER   CONTINUES    HIS    STOBY. 

"There  is  not  a  mystical  creation,  type,  symbol,  or  poetical 
invention  for  meanings  abstruse,  recondite,  and  incomprehens- 
ible, which  is  not  represented  by  the  female  gender,"  said  my 
father,  having  his  hand  quite  buried  in  his  waistcoat.  "  For 
instance,  the  Sphinx  and  Isis,  whose  veil  no  man  had  ever  lift- 
ed, were  both  ladies,  Kitty !  And  so  was  Persephone,  who 
most  be  always  either  in  heaven  or  hell — and  Hecate,  who  was 
one  thing  by  night  and  another  by  day.  The  Sibyls  were  fe- 
males ;  and  so  were  the  Gorgons,  the  Harpies,  the  Furies,  the 
Fates,  and  the  Teutonic  Valkyrs,  Xornies,  and  Hela  herself: 
in  short,  all  representations  of  ideas,  obscure,  inscrutable,  and 
portentous,  are  nouns  feminine." 

Heaven  bless  my  father!  Augustine  Caxton  was  himself 
again  !  I  began  to  fear  that  the  story  had  slipped  away  from 
him,  lost  in  that  labyrinth  of  learning.  But,  luckily,  as  he 
paused  for  breath,  his  look  fell  on  those  liquid  blue  eyes  of  my 
mother's,  and  that  honest  open  brow  of  hers,  which  had  cer- 
tainly nothing  in  common  with  Sphinges,  Fates,  Furies,  or 
Valkyrs  ;  and  whether  his  heart  smote  him,  or  his  reason  made 
him  own  that  he  had  fallen  into  a  very  disingenuous  and  un- 
sound train  of  assertion,  I  know  not,  but  his  front  relaxed,  and 
with  a  smile  he  resumed — "Ellinor  was  the  last  person  in  the 
world  to  deceive  any  one  willingly.  Did  she  deceive  me  and 
Roland,  that  we  both,  though  not  conceited  men,  fancied  that, 
if  we  had  dared  to  speak  openly  of  love,  we  had  not  so  dared 
in  vain  V  or  do  you  think,  Kitty,  that  a  woman  really  can  love 
(not  much,  perhaps,  but  somewhat)  two  or  three,  or  half-a-dozen 
at  a  time?" 

"  EmpossibleH'  cried  my  mother.  "And  as  for  this  Lady 
Ellinor,  T  am  shocked  a1  her — I  don't  know  what  to  call  it!" 

"NV>r  I  either,my  dear,"  said  my  father,  slowly  taking  his 
hand  from  his  waistcoat,  as  if  the  effort  were  too  much  for  him, 
and   the  problem  were  insoluble.      "But  this,  begging  your 


A    FAMILY    PICTUKE.  177 

pardon,  I  do  think,  that  before  a  young  woman  does  really, 
truly,  and  cordially  centre  her  affections  on  one  object,  she  suf- 
fers fancy,  imagination,  the  desire  of  power,  curiosity,  or  heaven 
knows  what,  to  simulate,  even  to  her  own  mind,  pale  reflec- 
tions of  the  luminary  not  yet  risen — parhelia  that  precede  the 
sun.  Don't  judge  of  Roland  as  you  see  him  now,  Pisistratus 
— grim,  and  gray,  and  formal ;  imagine  a  nature  soaring  high 
amongst  daring  thoughts,  or  exuberant  with  the  nameless 
poetry  of  youthful  life — with  a  frame  matchless  for  bounding 
elasticity  —  an  eye  bright  with  haughty  fire  —  a  heart  from 
which  noble  sentiments  sprang  like  sparks  from  an  anvil. 
Lady  Ellinor  had  an  ardent,  inquisitive  imagination.  This 
bold  fiery  nature  must  have  moved  her  interest.  On  the  oth- 
er hand,  she  had  an  instructed,  full,  and  eager  mind.  Am  I 
vain  if  I  say,  now  after  the  lapse  of  so  many  years,  that  in  my 
mind  her  intellect  felt  companionship  ?  When  a  woman  loves, 
and  marries,  and  settles,  why  then  she  becomes — a  one  whole, 
a  completed  being.  But  a  girl  like  Ellinor  has  in  her  many 
women.  Various  herself,  all  varieties  please  her.  I  do  believe 
that,  if  either  of  us  had  spoken  the  word  boldly,  Lady  Ellinor 
would  have  shrunk  back  to  her  own  heart — examined  it,  task- 
ed it,  and  given  a  frank  and  generous  answer.  And  he  who 
had  spoken  first  might  have  had  the  better  chance  not  to  re- 
ceive a  'No.'  But  neither  of  us  spoke.  And  perhaps  she 
was  rather  curious  to  know  if  she  had  made  an  impression, 
than  anxious  to  create  it.  It  was  not  that  she  willingly  de- 
ceived us,  but  her  whole  atmosphere  was  delusion.  Mists 
come  before  the  sunrise.  However  this  be,  Roland  and  I  were 
not  long  in  detecting  each  other.  And  hence  arose,  first  cold- 
ness, then  jealousy,  then  quarrel." 

"  Oh,  my  father,  your  love  must  have  been  indeed  powerful  to 
have  made  a  breach  between  the  hearts  of  two  such  brothers !" 

"  Yes,"  said  my  father,  "  it  was  amidst  the  old  ruins  of  the 
castle,  there,  where  I  had  first  seen  Ellinor — that,  winding  my 
arm  round  Roland's  neck,  as  I  found  him  seated  amongst  the 
weeds  and  stones,  his  face  buried  in  his  hands — it  was  there 
that  I  said,  '  Brother,  we  both  love  this  woman !  My  nature 
is  the  calmer  of  the  two ;  I  shall  feel  the  loss  less.  Brother, 
shake  hands,  and  God  speed  you,  for  I  go.' " 

"  Austin !"  murmured  my  mother,  sinking  her  head  on  my 
father's  breast. 

H2 


1  7s  tiii:  CAXTONS; 

w*  And  therewith  we  quarrelled.  For  it  was  Roland  who  in- 
sisted, while  the  tears  rolled  down  his  eyes,  and  he  stamped 
his  foot  on  the  ground,  thai  he  was  the  intruder,  the  interloper 
— that  he  had  qo  hope — that  he  had  been  a  foo]  and  a  mad- 
man— and  that  it  was  for  him  to  go!  Now,  while  we  were 
disputing,  and  words  began  to  run  high,  my  father's  old  serv- 
ant entered  the  desolate  place,  with  a  note  from  Lady'Ellinor 
1 1 »  me,  asking  for  the  loan  of  some  book  I  had  praised.  Roland 
Baw  the  handwriting,  and  while  I  turned  the  note  over  and 
over  irresolutely  before  I  broke  the  seal,  he  vanished. 

**  I  le  did  not  return  to  my  father's  house.  We  did  not  know 
what  had  become  of  him.  But  I,  thinking  over  that  impulsive 
volcanic  nature,  took  quick  alarm.  And  I  went  in  search  of 
him;  came  on  his  track  at  last;  and,  after  many  days,  found 
him  in  a  miserable  cottage  amongst  the  most  dreary  of  the 
dreary  wastes  which  form  so  large  a  part  of  Cumberland.  He 
was  so  altered,  I  scarcely  knew  him.  To  be  brief,  we  came  at 
last  to  a  compromise.  We  would  go. back  to  Compton.  This 
suspense  was  intolerable.  One  of  us  at  least  should  take  cour- 
age and  learn  his  fate.  But  who  should  speak  first?  We 
drew  lots,  and  the  lot  fell  on  me. 

"  And  now  that  I  was  really  to  pass  the  Rubicon,  now  that 
I  was  to  impart  that  secret  hope  which  had  animated  me  so 
long — been  to  me  a  new  life — what  were  my  sensations  ?  My 
dear  boy,  depend  on  it  that  that  age  is  the  happiest,  when  such 
feelings  as  I  felt  then  can  agitate  us  no  more:  they  are  mis- 
takes in  the  serene  order  of  that  majestic  life  which  heaven 
meant  for  thoughtful  man.  Our  souls  should  be  as  stars  on 
earth,  not  as  meteors  and  tortured  comets.  What  could  I  of- 
fer to  Ellinor,  to  her  father?  What  but  a  future  of  patient 
labour  ?  And  in  either  answer,  what  alternative  of  misery ! — 
my  own  existence  shattered,  or  Roland's  noble  heart ! 

M  Well,  we  went  to  Compton.  In  our  former  visits  Ave  had 
been  almost  the  only  guests.  Lord  Rainsforth  did  not  much 
affect  the  intercourse  of  country  squires,  less  educated  then 
than  now;  and  in  excuse  for  Ellinor  and  lor  us,  Ave  were  al- 
most the  only  men  of  our  own  age  she  had  seen  in  that  large 
dull  house  But  now  the  London  season  had  broken  up,  the 
house  w:is  filled;  there  was  qo  longer  that  familiar  and  con- 
stant approach  to  the  mistress  of  the  Hall,  which  had  made  ns 
like  one  family.     Great  ladies,  line  people  were  round  her;  a 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  ]  79 

look,  a  smile,  a  passing  word  were  as  much  as  I  had  a  right  to 
expect.  And  the  talk.  too.  how  different !  Before.  I  could 
speak  on  books, — I  was  at  home  there !  Roland  could  pour 
forth  his  dreams,  his  chivalrous  love  for  the  past,  his  bold  defi- 
ance of  the  unknown  future.  And  Ellinor.  cultivated  and  fanci- 
ful, could  sympathize  with  both.  And  her  father,  scholar  and 
gentleman,  could  sympathize  too.     But  now — " 


CHAPTER  VII. 

WHEEETX    MY   FATHEE    BRINGS    OUT    HIS    DENOUEMENT, 

"  It  is  no  use  in  the  world."  said  my  lather.  c-  to  know  all 
the  languages  expounded  in  grammars  and  splintered  up  into 
lexicons,  if  we  don't  learn  the  language  of  the  world.  It  is  a 
talk  apart.  Kitty."'  cried  my  lather,  warming  up.  ''It  is  an 
Anaglyph — a  spoken  anaglyph,  my  dear !  If  all  the  hiero- 
glyph- of  the  Egyptians  had  been  A  B  C  to  you.  still  if  you 
did  not  know  the  anaglyph,  you  would  know  nothing  of  the 
true  mysteries  of  the  priests.* 

'•  Neither  Roland  nor  I  knew  one  symbol  letter  of  the  ana- 
glyph. Talk,  talk — talk  on  persons  we  never  heard  of — things 
we  never  cared  for.  All  we  thought  of  importance,  puerile  or 
pedantic  trifles — all  we  thought  so  trite  and  childish,  the  grand 
momentous  business  of  life!  If  you  found  a  little  schoolboy, 
on  his  half-holiday,  fishing  for  minnows  with  a  crooked  pin. 
and  you  began  to  tell  him  of  all  the  wonders  of  the  deep,  the 
laws  of  the  tides,  and  the  antediluvian  relics  of  iguanodon  and 
ichthyosaurus  —  nay,  if  you  spoke  but  of  pearl-fisheries  and 
coral  banks,  or  water-kelpies  and  naiads,  would  not  the  little 
boy  cry  out  peevishly.  ;  Don't  tease  me  with  all  that  nonsense ! 
let  me  fish  in  peace  for  my  minnows !'  I  think  the  little  boy 
is  right  after  his  own  way — it  was  to  fish  for  minnows  that  he 
came  out.  poor  child,  not  to  hear  about  ignanodons  and  water- 
kelpii  - ! 

"So  the  company  fished  for  minnows,  and  not  a  word  could 
we  say  about  our  pearl-fisheries  and  coral  banks !  And  as  for 
fishing  for  minnows  ourselves,  my  dear  boy.  we  should  have 
been  less  bewildered  if  you  had  asked  us  to  fish  for  a  mermaid ! 

*  The  anaglyph  was  peculiar  to  the  Egyptian  priests — the  hieroglyph 
generally  known  to  the  well-educated. 


I  80  THE   CAXTONS: 

Do  yon  Bee,  now,  one  reason  why  I  have  let  you  go  thus  early 
into  the  world  ?  Well,  but  amongst  these  minnow-fishers  there 
was  one  who  fished  with  an  air  that  made  the  minnows  look 
larger  than  salmons. 

"Trevanion  had  been  at  Cambridge  with  me.  We  were 
even  intimate.  He  was  a  young  man  like  myself,  with  his 
way  to  make  in  the  world.  Poor  as  I — of  a  family  upon  a  par 
with  mine — old  enough,  but  decayed.  There  was,  however, 
this  difference  between  us:  he  had  connections  in  the  great 
world  —  I  had  none.  Like  me,  his  chief  pecuniary  resource 
was  a  college  fellowship.  Now,  Trevanion  had  established  a 
high  reputation  at  the  University  ;  but  less  as  a  scholar,  though 
a  pretty  fair  one,  than  as  a  man  to  rise  in  life.  Every  faculty 
he  had  was  an  energy.  He  aimed  at  everything — lost  some 
things — gained  others.  He  was  a  great  speaker  in  a  debating 
society,  a  member  of  some  politico-economical  club.  He  was 
an  eternal  talker  —  brilliant,  various,  paradoxical,  florid  —  dif- 
ferent from  what  he  is  now.  For,  dreading  fancy,  his  career 
since  has  been  one  effort  to  curb  it.  But  all  his  mind  attach- 
ed itself  to  something  that  we  Englishmen  call  solid :  it  was  a 
large  mind  —  not,  my  dear  Kitty,  like  a  fine  whale  sailing 
through  knowledge  from  the  pleasure  of  sailing — but  like  a 
polypus,  that  puts  forth  all  its  feelers  for  the  purpose  of  catch- 
ing hold  of  something.  Trevanion  had  gone  at  once  to  London 
from  the  University :  his  reputation  and  his  talk  dazzled  his 
connections,  and  not  unjustly.  They  made  an  effort — they  got 
him  into  Parliament :  he  had  spoken,  he  had  succeeded.  He 
came  to  Compton  in  the  flush  of  his  virgin  fame.  I  cannot 
convey  to  you  who  know  him  now — with  his  careworn  face, 
and  abrupt  dry  manner — reduced  by  perpetual  gladiatorship 
to  the  skin  and  bone  of  his  former  self — what  that  man  was 
when  he  first  stepped  into  the  arena  of  life. 

"  You  see,  my  listeners,  that  you  have  to  recollect  that  we 
middle-aged  folks  were  young  then;  that  is  to  say,  we  were 
as  differenl  from  what  we  are  now,  as  the  green  bough  of 
summer  is  from  the  dry  wood,  out  of  which  we  make  a  ship 
or  a  gate-post.  Neither  man  nor  wood  comes  to  the  uses  of 
life  till  the  green  leaves  are  stripped  and  the  sap  gone.  And 
.Inn  the  uses  of  life  transform  us  into  strange  things  with 
other  names:  the  tree  is  a  tree  no  more — it  is  a  gate  or  a 

-hip;  the  youth  is  a  youth  no  more,  but  a  one-legged  soldier; 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  181 

a  hollow-eyed  statesman ;  a  scholar  spectacled  and  slippered ! 
When  Micyllus — (here  the  hand  slides  into  the  waistcoat 
again!)  —  when  Micyllus,"  said  my  father,  "asked  the  cock 
that  had  once  been  Pythagoras,*  if  the  affair  of  Troy  was 
really  as  Homer  told  it,  the  cock  replied  scornfully,  'How 
could  Homer  know  anything  about  it? — at  that  time  he  was  a 
camel  in  Bactria.'  Pisistratus,  according  to  the  doctrine  of 
metempsychosis,  you  might  have  been  a  Bactrian  camel,  when 
that  which  to  my  life  was  the  siege  of  Troy  saw  Roland  and 
Trevanion  before  the  walls. 

"  Handsome  you  can  see  that  Trevanion  has  been ;  but  the 
beauty  of  his  countenance  was  then  in  its  perpetual  play,  its 
intellectual  eagerness ;  and  his  conversation  was  so  discursive, 
so  various,  so  animated,  and,  above  all,  so  full  of  the  thiugs  of 
the  day !  If  he  had  been  a  priest  of  Serapis  for  fifty  years,  he 
could  not  have  known  the  anaglyph  better.  Therefore  he  fill- 
ed up  every  crevice  and  pore  of  that  hollow  society  with  his 
broken,  inquisitive,  petulant  light.  Therefore  he  was  admired, 
talked  of,  listened  to;  and  everybody  said,  'Trevanion  is  a 
rising  man.' 

"  Yet  I  did  not  do  him  then  the  justice  I  have  done  since ; 
for  we  students  and  abstract  thinkers  are  apt  too  much,  in  our 
first  youth,  to  look  to  the  depth  of  a  man's  mind  or  knowledge, 
and  not  enough  to  the  surface  it  may  cover.  There  may  be 
more  water  in  a  flowing  stream,  only  four  feet  deep,  and  cer- 
tainly more  force  and  more  health,  than  in  a  sullen  pool  thirty 
yards  to  the  bottom.  I  did  not  do  Trevanion  justice.  I  did 
not  see  how  naturally  he  realized  Lady  Ellinor's  ideal.  I  have 
said  that  she  was  like  many  women  in  one.  Trevanion  was  a 
thousand  men  in  one.  He  had  learning  to  please  her  mind, 
eloquence  to  dazzle  her  fancy,  beauty  to  please  her  eye,  reputa- 
tion precisely  of  the  kind  to  allure  her  vanity,  honour  and  con- 
scientious purpose  to  satisfy  her  judgment ;  and,  above  all,  he 
was  ambitious ;  ambitious,  not  as  I — not  as  Roland  was,  but 
ambitious  as  Ellinor  was :  ambitious,  not  to  realize  some  grand, 
ideal  in  the  silent  heart,  but  to  grasp  the  practical  positive 
substances  that  lay  without. 

"  Ellinor  was  a  child  of  the  great  world,  and  so  was  he. 

"  I  saw  not  all  this,  nor  did  Roland ;  and  Trevanion  seemed 
to  pay  no  particular  court  to  Ellinor. 

*  Lucian,  The  Dream  ofMxcjjlhis. 


1  B2  THE   I  axtiins: 

"But  the  time  approached  when  I  ought  to  speak.  The 
house  began  to  thin.  Lord  Rainsforth  had  leisure  to  resume 
his  easy  conferences  with  me;  and  one  day,  walking  in  his 
garden,  he  gave  me  the  opportunity ;  for  I  need  not  say,  Pisis- 
tratus,"  Baid  my  father,  looking  at  me  earnestly,  "that  before 
any  man  of  honour,  if  of  inferior  worldly  possessions,  will  open 
his  heart  seriously  to  the  daughter,  it  is  his  duty  to  speak  first 
to  the  parent,  whose  confidence  has  imposed  that  trust."  I 
Lowed  my  head  and  coloured. 

"I  know  not  how  it  was,"  continued  my  father,  "but  Lord 
Rainsforth  turned  the  conversation  on  Ellinor.  After  speak- 
ing of  his  expectations  in  his  son,  who  was  returning  home, 
he  said,  'But  he  will  of  course  enter  public  life — will,  I 
trust,  soon  marry,  have  a  separate  establishment,  and  I  shall 
see  but  little  of  him.  My  Ellinor ! — I  cannot  bear  the  thought 
of  parting  wholly  with  her.  And  that,  to  say  the  selfish  truth, 
is  one  reason  why  I  have  never  wished  her  to  marry  a  rich 
man,  and  so  leave  me  for  ever.  I  could  hope  that  she  will 
give  herself  to  one  who  may  be  contented  to  reside  at  least  a 
great  part  of  the  year  with  me,  who  may  bless  me  with  an- 
other son,  not  steal  from  me  a  daughter.  I  do  not  mean  that 
he  should  waste  his  life  in  the  country;  his  occupations  would 
probably  lead  him  to  London.  I  care  not  where  my  house  is 
— all  I  want  is  to  keep  my  home.  You  know'  (he  added,  with 
a  smile  that  I  thought  meaning)  'how  often  I  have  implied  to 
you  that  I  have  no  vulgar  ambition  for  Ellinor.  Her  portion 
must  be  very  small,  for  my  estate  is  strictly  entailed,  and  I 
have  lived  too  much  up  to  my  income  all  my  life  to  hope  to 
save  much  now.  But  her  tastes  do  not  require  expense;  and 
while  I  live,  at  least,  there  need  be  no  change.  She  can  only 
prefer  a  man  whose  talents,  congenial  to  hers,  will  win  their 
own  career,  and  ere  I  die  that  career  may  be  made.'  Lord 
Rainsforth  paused;  and  then — how,  in  what  words  I  know 
not — but  out  all  burst! — my  long-suppressed,  timid,  anxious, 
doubtful,  fearful  love.  The  Btrange  energy  it  had  given  to  a 
nature  till  then  so  retiring  and  calm  !  My  recent  devotion  to 
the  law — my  confidence  thai  with  sueh  a  prize  I  could  succeed 
— it  was  but  a  transfer  of  labour  from  one  study  to  another. 
Labour  could  conquer  all  things,  and  custom  sweeten  them  in 
the  conquest.  The  bar  was  a  less  brilliant  career  than  the 
Senate.      But  the  first  aim  of  the  poor  man  should  be  independ- 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  183 

ence.  In  short,  Pisistratus,  wretched  egotist  that  I  was,  I  for- 
got Roland  in  that  moment ;  and  I  spoke  as  one  who  felt  his 
life  was  in  his  words. 

"Lord  Rainsforth  looked  at  me,  when  I  had  done,  with  a 
countenance  full  of  affection,  but  it  was  not  cheerful. 

" '  My  dear  Caxton,'  said  he,  tremulously,  '  I  own  that  I 
once  wished  this — wished  it  from  the  hour  I  knew  you ;  but 
why  did  you  so  long — I  never  suspected  that — nor,  I  am  sure, 
did  Ellinor.'  He  stopped  short,  and  added  quickly — 'How- 
ever, go  and  speak,  as  you  have  spoken  to  me,  to  Ellinor. 
Go,  it  may  not  yet  be  too  late.     And  yet — but  go.' 

"  Too  late ! — what  meant  those  words  ?  Lord  Rainsforth 
had  turned  hastily  down  another  walk,  and  left  me  alone,  to 
ponder  over  an  answer  which  concealed  a  riddle.  Slowly  I 
took  my  way  towards  the  house,  and  sought  Lady  Ellinor, 
half  hoping,  half  dreading  to  find  her  alone.  There  was  a  lit- 
tle room  communicatiug  with  a  conservatory,  where  she  usual- 
ly sat  in  the  morning.     Thither  I  took  my  course. 

"  That  room — I  see  it  still ! — the  walls  covered  with  pictures 
from  her  own  hand,  many  were  sketches  of  the  haunts  we  had 
visited  together — the  simple  ornaments,  womanly  but  not  ef- 
feminate— the  very  books  on  the  table,  that  had  been  made 
familiar  by  dear  associations.  Yes  ;  there,  the  llisso  in  which 
we  had  read  together  the  episode  of  Glorinda — there,  the 
^Eschylus  in  which  I  translated  to  her  the  Prometheus.  Ped- 
antries these  might  seem  to  some;  pedantries  perhaps  they 
were ;  but  they  were  proofs  of  that  congeniality  which  had 
knit  the  man  of  books  to  the  daughter  of  the  world.  That 
room,  it  was  the  home  of  my  heart.  Such,  in  my  vanity  of 
spirit,  methought  would  be  the  air  round  a  home  to  come.  I 
looked  about  me,  troubled  and  confused,  and,  halting  timidly, 
I  saw  Ellinor  before  me,  leaning  her  face  on  her  hand,  her 
cheek  more  flushed  than  usual,  and  tears  in  her  eyes.  I  ap- 
proached in  silence,  and  as  I  drew  my  chair  to  the  table,  my 
eye  fell  on  a  glove  on  the  floor.  It  was  a  man's  glove.  Do 
you  know,"  said  my  father,  "  that  once,  when  I  was  young,  I 
saw  a  Dutch  picture  called  The  Glove,  and  the  subject  was 
of  murder  ?  There  was  a  weed-grown  marshy  pool,  a  desolate 
dismal  landscape,  that  of  itself  inspired  thoughts  of  ill  deeds 
and  terror.  And  two  men,  as  if  walking  by  chance,  came  to 
this  pool ;  the  finger  of  one  pointed  to  a  blood-stained  glove, 


184  Tin:  CAZT01    ! 

and  the  eyes  of  both  were  fixed  on  each  other,  as  if  there  were 
no  need  of  words.  Thai  glove  told  its  tale!  The  picture  had 
Long  haunted  me  in  my  boyhood,  but  it  never  gave  me  so  un- 
easy and  fearful  a  feeling  as  did  thai  real  glove  upon  the  floor. 
Why?  My  dear  Pisistratus,  the  theory  of  forebodings  in- 
volves one  of  those  questions  on  which  we  may  ask  'why'  for 
ever.  .More  chilled  than  I  had  been  in  speaking  to  her  father, 
I  took  heart  at  last,  and  spoke  to  Ellinor." 

My  father  stopped  short,  the  moon  had  risen,  and  was 
shining  full  into  the  room  and  on  his  face.  And  by  that  light 
the  face  was  changed ;  young  emotions  had  brought  back 
youth — my  father  looked  a  young  man.  But  what  pain  was 
there!  If  the  memory  alone  could  raise  what,  after  all,  was 
but  the  ghost  of  suffering,  what  had  been  its  living  reality! 
Involuntarily  I  seized  his  hand ;  my  father  pressed  it  convul- 
sively, and  said  with  a  deep  breath — "  It  was  too  late  ;  Tre- 
vanion  was  Lady  Ellinor's  accepted,  plighted,  happy  lover. 
My  dear  Katherine,  I  do  not  envy  him  now ;  look  up,  sweet 
wife,  look  up !" 


CHAPTER  YIII. 

"  Ellixor  (let  me  do  her  justice)  was  shocked  at  my  silent 
emotion.  Xo  human  lip  could  utter  more  tender  sympathy, 
more  noble  self-reproach  ;  but  that  was  no  balm  to  my  wound. 
So  I  left  the  house ;  so  I  never  returned  to  the  law ;  so  all  im- 
petus, all  motive  for  exertion,  seemed  taken  from  my  being ; 
so  I  went  back  into  books.  And  so,  a  moping,  despondent, 
worthless  mourner  might  I  have  been  to  the  end  of  my  days, 
but  that  Heaven,  in  its  mercy,  sent  thy  mother,  Pisistratus, 
across  my  path;  and  day  and  night  I  bless  God  and  her;  for 
I  have  been,  and  am — oh,  indeed,  I  am,  a  happy  man!" 

My  mother  threw  herself  on  my  father's  breast,  sobbing  vi- 
olently, and  then  turned  from  the  room  without  a  word;  my 
father's  eye,  swimming  in  tears,  followed  her;  and  then,  after 
pacing  ihe  room  for  some  moments  in  silence,  he  came  up  to 
me,  and  leaning  his  arm  on  my  shoulder,  whispered,  "Canyon 
guess  why  1  have  now  told  you  .-ill  this,  my  son?" 

••  Fes,  partly  :  thank  you,  father,"  I  faltered,  and  sat  down, 
for  I  f.lt  faint. 


A    FAMILY    PICTUEE.  185 

-  "Some  sons,"  said  my  father,  seating  himself  beside  me, 
"  would  find  in  their  fathers'  follies  and  errors  an  excuse  for 
their  own ;  not  so  will  yon,  Pisistratus." 

"  I  see  no  folly,  no  error,  sir ;  only  nature  and  sorrow." 
"  Pause  ere  you  thus  think,"  said  my  father.  "  Great  was 
the  folly  and  great  the  error  of  indulging  imagination  that  had 
no  basis — of  linking  the  whole  usefulness  of  my  life  to  the  will 
of  a  human  creature  like  myself.  Heaven  did  not  design  the 
passion  of  love  to  be  this  tyrant ;  nor  is  it  so  with  the  mass 
and  multitude  of  human  life.  We  dreamers,  solitary  students 
like  me,  or  half-poets  like  poor  Roland,  make  our  own  disease. 
How  many  years,  even  after  I  had  gained  serenity,  as  your 
mother  gave  me  a  home  long  not  appreciated,  have  I  wasted! 
The  mainspring  of  my  existence  was  snapped — I  took  no  note 
of  time.  And  therefore  now,  you  see,  late  in  life,  Xemesis 
wakes.  I  look  back  with  regret  at  powers  neglected,  oppor- 
tunities gone.  Galvanically  I  brace  up  energies  half-palsied  by 
disuse ;  and  you  see  me,  rather  than  rest  quiet  and  good  for 
nothing,  talked  into  what,  I  dare  say,  are  sad  follies,  by  an 
Uncle  Jack !  And  now  I  behold  Ellinor  again ;  and  I  say  in 
wonder — '  All  this — all  this — all  this  agony,  all  this  torpor,  for 
that  haggard  face,  that  worldly  spirit !'  So  is  it  ever  in  life : 
mortal  things  fade ;  immortal  things  spring  more  freshly  with 
every  step  to  the  tomb. 

'•Ah!"  continued  my  father,  with  a  sigh,  "it  would  not 
have  been  so,  if  at  your  age  I  had  found  out  the  secret  of  the 
saffron  basj !" 


CHAPTER  IX. 

"And  Roland,  sir,"  said  I — " how  did  he  take  it?" 
"  With  all  the  indignation  of  a  proud  unreasonable  man. 
More  indignant,  poor  fellow,  for  me  than  himself.  And  so  did 
he  wound  and  gall  me  by  what  he  said  of  Ellinor,  and  so  did 
he  rage  against  me  because  I  would  not  share  his  rage,  that 
again  we  quarrelled.  We  parted,  and  did  not  meet  for  many 
years.  We  came  into  sudden  possession  of  our  little  fortunes. 
His  he  devoted  (as  you  may  know)  to  the  purchase  of  the  old 
ruins,  and  the  commission  in  the  army,  which  had  always  been 
his  dream — and  so  went  his  way,  wrathful.    My  share  gave  me 


tin;  <  a.xtoxs. 

an  excuse  for  indolence — it  satisfied  all  my  wants;  and  when 
my  old  tutor  died,  and  his  young  child  became  my  ward,  and, 
somehow  or  other,  from  my  ward  my  wife,  it  allowed  me  to 
resign  my  fellowship,  and  live  amongst  my  books — still  as  a 
book  myself.  One  comfort,  somewhat  before  my  marriage,  I 
had  conceived;  ami  that,  too,  Roland  has  since  said  was  com- 
fort to  him.  Ellinor  became  an  heiress.  Her  poor  brother 
died;  and  all  of  the  estate  that  did  not  pass  in  the  male  line 
devolved  on  her.  That  fortune  made  a  gulf  between  us  almost 
as  wide  as  her  marriage.  For  Ellinor,  poor  and  portionless  in 
spiio  of  her  rank,  I  could  have  worked,  striven,  slaved;  but 
Ellinor  rich  !  it  would  have  crushed  me.  This  was  a  comfort. 
But  still,  still  the  past — that  perpetual  aching  sense  of  some- 
thing that  had  seemed  the  essential  of  life  withdrawn  from 
life,  evermore,  evermore!  What  was  left  was  not  sorrow — it 
was  a  void.  Had  I  lived  more  with  men,  and  less  with  dreams 
and  books,  I  should  have  made  my  nature  large  enough  to 
bear  the  loss  of  a  single  passion.  But  in  solitude  we  shrink 
up.  No  plant  so  much  as  man  needs  the  sun  and  the  air.  I 
comprehend  now  why  most  of  our  best  and  wrisest  men  have 
lived  in  capitals  ;  and  therefore  again  I  say,  that  one  scholar  in 
a  family  is  enough.  Confiding  in  your  sound  heart  and  strong 
honour,  I  turn  you  thus  betimes  on  the  world.  Have  I  done 
wrong?  Prove  that  I"  have  not,  my  child.  Do  you  know 
what  a  very  good  man  has  said?  Listen,  and  followr  my  pre- 
cept, not  example. 

" '  The  state  of  the  world  is  such,  and  so  much  depends  on 
action,  that  everything  seems  to  say  aloud  to  every  man,  Do 
something — do  it — do  it!'"* 

I  Avas  profoundly  touched,  and  I  rose  refreshed  and  hopeful, 
when  suddenly  the  door  opened,  and  who  or  what  in  the  world 
should  come  in  ;  but  certainly  he,  she,  it,  or  they,  shall  not  come 
into  this  chapter!  On  that  point  I  am  resolved.  No,my  dear 
young  lady,  I  am  extremely  flattered; — I  feel  for  your  curiosi- 
ty; but  really  not  a  peep — not  one!  And  yet — well  then,  if 
you  will  have  it,  and  look  so  coaxingly — who  or  what,  I  Bay, 
should  come  iu  abrupt,  unexpected — taking  away  one's  breath, 
not  giving  one  time  to  say  ct  By  your  leave,  or  with  your  leave," 

hut   making  one's   mOUth  Stand  open   with  surprise,  and  one's 

eyes  fix  in  a  big  round  si upid  stare, but — 

THE     KM)    OP    'Mil':    CHAPTER, 

*  Remains  of  the  Rev.  Richard  Cecil,  p.  349. 


PART  EIGHTH. 

CHAPTER  I. 

Theee  entered,  in  the  front  drawing-room  of  my  father's 
house  in  Russell  Street — an  Elf! ! !  clad  in  white, — small,  deli- 
cate, with  curls  of  jet  over  her  shoulders ; — with  eyes  so  large 
and  so  lustrous  that  they  shone  through  the  room,  as  no  eyes 
merely  human  could  possibly  shine.  The  Elf  approached,  and 
stood  facing  us.  The  sight  was  so  unexpected,  and  the  appa- 
rition so  strange,  that  we  remained  for  some  moments  in  start- 
led silence.  At  length  my  father,  as  the  bolder  and  wiser  man 
of  the  two,  and  the  more  fitted  to  deal  with  the  eerie  things 
of  another  world,  had  the  audacity  to  step  close  up  to  the  little 
creature,  and,  bending  down  to  examine  its  face,  said,  "  What 
do  you  want,  my  pretty  child  ?" 

Pretty  child !  was  it  only  a  pretty  child  after  all  ?  Alas,  it 
would  be  well  if  all  we  mistake  for  fairies  at  the  first  glance 
could  resolve  themselves  only  into  pretty  children ! 

"  Come,"  answered  the  child,  with  a  foreign  accent,  and  tak- 
ing my  father  by  the  lappet  of  his  coat,  "  come,  poor  papa  is 
so  ill !  I  am  frightened !  come — and  save  him." 

"  Certainly,"  exclaimed  my  father,  quickly :  "  where' s  my  hat, 
Sisty  ?     Certainly,  my  child,  we  will  go  and  save  papa." 

"But  who  is  papa?"  asked Pisistratus — a  question  that  would 
never  have  occurred  to  my  father.  He  never  asked  who  or 
what  the  sick  papas  of  poor  children  were,  when  the  children 
pulled  him  by  the  lappet  of  his  coat — "Who  is  papa?" 

The  child  looked  hard  at  me,  and  the  big  tears  rolled  from 
those  large  luminous  eyes,  but  quite  silently.  At  this  moment 
a  full-grown  figure  filled  up  the  threshold,  and,  emerging  from 
the  shadow,  presented  to  us  the  aspect  of  a  stout  well-favoured 
young  woman.  She  dropped  a  curtsy,  and  then  said,  minc- 
ing!^ 

"  Oh,  miss,  you  ought  to  have  waited  for  me,  and  not  alarm- 
ed the  gentlefolks  by  running  up-stairs  in  that  way.  If  you 
please,  sir,  I  was  settling  with  the  cabman,  and  he  was  so  im- 


L88  THE  <  \.\rn\s  : 

patient :  them  Low  fellows  always  are,  when  they  have  only  us 
poor  women  to  deal  with,  sir — and — " 

"  Bui  what  is  the  matter?"  cried  I,  for  my  father  had  taken 
the  child  in  his  arms,  soothingly,  and  she  was  now  weeping  on 
hi-  breast. 

"  Why,  you  see,  sir  (another  curtsy),  the  gent  only  arrived 
lasl  night  at  our  hotel,  sir — the  Lamb,  close  by  Lun nun  Bridge 
— and  lie  Mas  taken  ill — and  he's  not  quite  in  his  right  mind 
like:  so  we  senl  lor  the  doctor,  and  the  doctor  looked  at  the 
brass  plate  on  the  gent's  carpet-bag,  sir — and  he  then  looked 
into  the  Court  Guide,  and  he  said,  'There  is  a  Mr.  Caxton  in 
Great  Russell  Street, — is  he  any  relation?'  and  this  young  lady 
said,  'That's  my  papa's  brother,  and  we  were  going  there.' 
And  bo,  sir,  as  the  Boots  was  out,  I  got  into  a  cab,  and  miss 
would  come  with  me,  and — " 

"  Roland — Roland  ill !  Quick — quick,  quick !"  cried  my  fa- 
ther, and,  with  the  child  still  in  his  arms,  he  ran  down  the  stairs. 
I  followed  with  his  hat,  which  of  course  he  had  forgotten.  A 
cab,  by  good  luck,  was  passing  our  very  door;  but  the  cham- 
bermaid would  not  let  us  enter  it  till  she  had  satisfied  herself 
that  it  was  not  the  same  she  had  dismissed.  This  preliminary 
investigation  completed,  we  entered,  and  drove  to  the  Lamb. 

The  chambermaid,  who  sate  opposite,  passed  the  time  in  in- 
effectual overtures  to  relieve  my  father  of  the  little  girl,  who 
still  clung  nestling  to  his  breast, — in  a  long  epic,  much  broken 
into  episodes,  of  the  causes  which  had  led  to  her  dismissal  of 
the  late  cabman,  who,  to  swell  his  fare,  had  thought  proper  to 
take  a  "  circumbendibus !" — and  with  occasional  tugs  at  her 
cap,  and  smoothings  down  of  her  gown,  and  apologies  for  be- 
ing such  a  figure,  especially  when  her  eyes  rested  on  my  satin 
cravat,  or  drooped  on  my  shining  boots. 

Arrived  at  the  Lamb,  the  chambermaid,  with  conscious  dig- 
nity, led  us  up  a  large  staircase,  which  seemed  interminable. 
A-  -lie  mounted  the  region  above  the  third  story,  she  paused 
to  take  breath,  and  inform  us,  apologetically,  that  the  house 
was  full,  but  that,  if  the  "gent"  stayed  over  Friday,  he  would 
l.<-  moved  into  No. 54,  "  with  alook-oul  and  a  chimbly."  My 
little  cousin  now  slipped  from  niv  father's  arms,  and,  running 
up  the  stairs,  beckoned  to  us  i<>  follow.     We  did  so,  and  were 

Led  to  a  door,  at  which  the  child  Stopped  and  listened;  then, 
taking  oil'  her  shoes,  she  stole  in  on  tiptoe.  We  entered  after 
her. 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  189 

By  the  light  of  a  single  candle  we  saw  my  poor  uncle's  face ; 
it  was  flushed  with  fever,  and  the  eyes  had  that  bright  vacant 
stare  which  it  is  so  terrible  to  meet.  Less  terrible  is  it  to  find 
the  body  wasted,  the  features  sharp  with  the  great  life-strug- 
gle, than  to  look  on  the  face  from  which  the  mind  is  gone, — 
the  eyes  in  which  there  is  no  recognition.  Such  a  sight  is  a 
startling  shock  to  that  unconscious  habitual  materialism  with 
which  we  are  apt  familiarly  to  regard  those  we  love :  for,  in 
thus  missing  the  mind,  the  heart,  the  affection  that  sprang  to 
ours,  we  are  suddenly  made  aware  that  it  was  the  something 
within  the  form,  and  not  the  form  itself,  that  was  so  dear  to 
us.  The  form  itself  is  still,  perhaps,  little  altered ;  but  that  lip 
which  smiles  no  welcome,  that  eye  which  wanders  over  us  as 
strangers,  that  ear  which  distinguishes  no  more  our  voices, — 
the  friend  we  sought  is  not  there !  Even  our  own  love  is  chill- 
ed back — grows  a  kind  of  vague  superstitious  terror.  Yes,  it 
was  not  the  matter,  still  present  to  us,  which  had  conciliated 
all  those  subtle  nameless  sentiments  which  are  classed  and  fused 
in  the  word  " affection" — it  was  the  airy, intangible,  electric 
something, — the  absence  of  which  now  appals  us. 

I  stood  speechless — my  father  crept  on,  and  took  the  hand 
that  returned  no  pressure : — The  child  only  did  not  seem  to 
share  our  emotions,  but,  clambering  on  the  bed,  laid  her  cheek 
on  the  breast,  and  was  still. 

"  Pisistratus,"  whispered  my  father  at  last,  and  I  stole  near, 
hushing  my  breath, — "  Pisistratus,  if  your  mother  were  here !" 

I  nodded :  the  same  thought  had  struck  us  both.  His  deep 
wisdom,  my  active  youth,  both  felt  their  nothingness  then  and 
there.  In  the  sick-chamber,  both  turned  helplessly  to  miss  the 
ivoman. 

So  I  stole  out,  descended  the  stairs,  and  stood  in  the  open  air 
in  a  sort  of  stunned  amaze.  Then  the  tramp  of  feet,  and  the 
roll  of  wheels,  and  the  great  London  roar,  revived  me.  That 
contagion  of  practical  life  which  lulls  the  heart  and  stimulates 
the  brain, — what  an  intellectual  mystery  there  is  in  its  com- 
mon atmosphere !  In  another  moment  I  had  singled  out,  like 
an  inspiration,  from  a  long  file  of  those  ministrants  of  our  Trivia, 
the  cab  of  the  lightest  shape  and  with  the  strongest  horse,  and 

Avas  on  my  way,  not  to  my  mother's,  but  to  Dr.  M H , 

Manchester  Square,  whom  I  knew  as  the  medical  adviser  to  the 
Trevanions.     Fortunately,  that  kind  and  able  physician  was  at 


L90  i  in-:   CAXTONS  : 

home,  and  he  promised  to  be  with  the  sufferer  before  I  myself 
could  join  him.  I  then  drove  to  Russell  Street,  and  broke  to 
inv  mother,  as  cautiously  as  1  could,  the  intelligence  with  which 
I  was  charged. 

When  we  arrived  at  the  Lamb,  we  found  the  doctor  already 
writing  his  prescription  and  injunctions:  the  activity  of  the 
treatment  announced  the  danger.  I  flew  for  the  surgeon  who 
had  been  before  called  in.  Ha})])}'  those  who  are  strange  to 
that  indescribable  silent  bustle  which  the  sick-room  at  times 
presents — that  conflict  which  seems  almost  hand  to  hand  be- 
tween life  and  death — when  all  the  poor,  unresisting,  uncon- 
scious frame  is  given  up  to  the  war  against  its  terrible  enemy ; 
the  dark  blood  flowing — flowing;  the  hand  on  the  pulse,  the 
hushed  suspense,  every  look  on  the  physician's  bended  brow; 
then  the  sinaplasms  to  the  feet  and  the  ice  to  the  head;  and 
now  and  then,  through  the  lull  of  the  low  whispers,  the  inco- 
herent voice  of  the  sufferer — babbling,  perhaps,  of  green  fields 
and  fairyland,  while  your  hearts  are  breaking !  Then,  at  length, 
the  sleep — in  that  sleep,  perhaps,  the  crisis — the  breathless 
watch,  the  slow  waking,  the  first  sane  words — the  old  smile 
again,  only  fainter — your  gushing  tears,  your  low  "  Thank  God! 
thank  God !" 

Picture  all  this;  it  is  past:  Roland  has  spoken — his  sense 
has  returned — my  mother  is  leaning  over  him — his  child's  small 
hands  are  clasped  round  his  neck — the  surgeon,  who  has  been 
there  six  hours,  has  taken  up  his  hat,  and  smiles  gaily  as  he 
nods  fareAvell — and  my  father  is  leaning  against  the  wall,  his 
face  covered  with  his  hands. 


CHAPTER  II. 

All  this  had  been  so  sudden  that,  to  use  the  trite  phrase — 
for  no  other  is  so  expressive — it  was  like  a  dream.  I  felt  an 
absolute,  an  imperious  want  of  solitude,  of  the  open  air.  The 
swell  of  gratitude  almost  stifled  me — the  room  did  not  seem 
large  enough  for  my  big  heart.  In  early  youth,  if  we  find  it 
difficult  to  control  our  feelings,  so  we  find  it  difficult  to  vent 
them  in  the  presence  of  others.  On  the  spring  side  of  twenty, 
if  anything  affects  us,  we  rush  to  lock  ourselves  up  in  our 
room,  or  get  away  into  the  streets  or  fields;  in  our  earlier 


A    FAMILY   PICTUJRE.  101 

years  we  are  still  the  savages  of  Nature,  and  we  do  as  the 
poor  brute  does, — the  wounded  stag  leaves  the  herd,  and  if 
there  is  anything  on  a  dog's  faithful  heart,  he  slinks  away  into 
a  comer. 

Accordingly,  I  stole  out  of  the  hotel,  and  wandered  through 
the  streets,  which  were  quite  deserted.  It  was  about  the  first 
hour  of  dawn,  the  most  comfortless  hour  there  is,  especially  in 
London !  But  I  only  felt  freshness  in  the  raw  air,  and  sooth- 
ing in  the  desolate  stillness.  The  love  my  uncle  inspired  was 
very  remarkable  in  its  nature :  it  was  not  like  that  quiet  affec- 
tion with  which  those  advanced  in  life  must  usually  content 
themselves,  but  connected  with  the  more  vivid  interest  that 
youth  awakens.  .  There  was  in  him  still  so  much  of  vivacity 
and  fire,  in  his  errors  and  crotchets  so  much  of  the  self-delusion 
of  youth,  that  one  could  scarce  fancy  him  other  than  young. 
Those  Quixotic  exaggerated  notions  of  honour,  that  romance 
of  sentiment,  which  no  hardship,  care,  grief,  disappointment, 
could  wear  away  (singular  in  a  period  when,  at  two-and-twenty, 
young  men  declare  themselves  biases  !)  seemed  to  leave  him 
all  the  charm  of  boyhood.  A  season  in  London  had  made  me 
more  a  man  of  the  world,  older  in  heart  than  he  was.  Then, 
the  sorrow  that  gnawed  him  with  such  silent  sternness.  No, 
Captain  Roland  was  one  of  those  men  who  seize  hold  of  your 
thoughts,  who  mix  themselves  up  with  your  lives.  The  idea 
that  Roland  should  die — die  with  the  load  at  his  heart  un- 
lightened,  was  one  that  seemed  to  take  a  spring  out  of  the 
wheels  of  nature,  an  object  out  of  the  aims  of  life — of  my  life 
at  least.  For  I  had  made  it  one  of  the  ends  of  my  existence 
to  bring  back  the  son  to  the  father,  and  restore  the  smile  that 
must  have  been  gay  once  to  the  downward  curve  of  that  iron 
lip.  But  Roland  was  now  out  of  danger, — and  yet,  like  one 
who  has  escaped  shipwreck,  I  trembled  to  look  back  on  the 
danger  past;  the  voice  of  the  devouring  deep  still  boomed  in 
my  ears.  While  rapt  in  my  reveries,  I  stopped  mechanically 
to  hear  a  clock  strike — four ;  and,  looking  round,  I  perceived 
that  I  had  wandered  from  the  heart  of  the  City,  and  was  in 
one  of  the  streets  that  lead  out  of  the  Strand.  Immediately 
before  me,  on  the  doorsteps  of  a  large  shop,  whose  closed  shut- 
ters wore  as  obstinate  a  stillness  as  if  they  had  guarded  the 
secrets  of  seventeen  centuries  in  a  street  in  Pompeii, — reclined 
a  form  fast  asleep ;  the  arm  propped  on  the  hard  stone  sup- 


1  92  THE   CAZTONS: 

porting  the  head,  and  the  limbs  uneasily  strewn  over  the  stairs. 
The  dress  of  the  Blnmberer  was  travel-stained,  tattered,  yet 
with  the  remains  of  a  certain  pretence:  an  air  of  faded,  shab- 
by,  penniless  gentility  made  poverty  more  painful,  because  it 
seemed  to  indicate  unfitness  to  grapple  with  it.  The  face  of 
this  person  was  hollow  and  pale,  but  its  expression,  even  in 
sleep,  was  fierce  and  hard.  I  drew  near  and  nearer;  I  recog- 
nized the  countenance,  the  regular  features,  the  raven  hair, 
even  a  peculiar  gracefulness  of  posture:'  the  young  man  whom 
I  had  met  at  the  inn  by  the  way-side,  and  who  had  left  me 
alone  with  the  Savoyard  and  his  mice  in  the  church-yard,  was 
before  me.  I  remained  behind  the  shadow  of  one  of  the  col- 
umns of  the  porch,  leaning  against  the  area  rails,  and  irres- 
olute whether  or  not  so  slight  an  acquaintance  justified  me  in 
waking  the  sleeper,  when  a  policeman,  suddenly  emerging  from 
an  angle  in  the  street,  terminated  my  deliberations  with  the 
decision  of  his  practical  profession ;  for  he  laid  hold  of  the 
young  man's  arm  and  shook  it  roughly, — "  You  must  not  lie 
here ;  get  up  and  go  home !"  The  sleeper  woke  with  a  quick 
start,  rubbed  his  eyes,  looked  round,  and  fixed  them  upon  the 
policeman  so  haughtily,  that  that  discriminating  functionary 
probably  thought  that  it  was  not  from  sheer  necessity  that  so 
improper  a  couch  had  been  selected,  and,  with  an  air  of  greater 
respect,  he  said,  "  You  have  been  drinking,  young  man, — can 
you  find  your  way  home  ?" 

"  Yes,"  said  the  youth,  resettling  himself,  "  you  see  I  have 
found  it !" 

"  By  the  Lord  Harry  !"  muttered  the  policeman,  "  if  he  ben't 
going  to  sleep  again !  Come,  come,  walk  on,  or  I  must  walk 
you  off." 

My  old  acquaintance  turned  round.  "Policeman,"  said  he, 
with  a  strange  sort  of  smile,  "  what  do  you  think  this  lodging 
is  worth  ? — I  don't  say  for  the  night,  for  you  see  that  is  over, 
but  for  the  next  two  hours  ?  The  lodging  is  primitive,  but  it 
suits  me;  I  should  think  a  shilling  would  be  a  fair  price  for  it 
—eh?" 

"  You  love  your  joke,  sir,"  said  the  policeman,  with  a  brow 
much  relaxed,  and  opening  his  hand  mechanically. 

"  Say  a  shilling,  then — it  is  a  bargain  !  I  hire  it  of  you  upon 
credit.     Good-night,  and  call  me  at  six  o'clock." 

With  that  the  young  man  settled  himself  so  resolutely,  and 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  193 

the  policeman's  face  exhibited  such  bewilderment,  that  I  burst 
out  laughing,  and  came  from  my  hiding-place. 

The  policeman  looked  at  me.     "  Do  you  know  this — this — " 

"  This  gentleman  ?"  said  I,  gravely.  "  Yes,  you  may  leave 
him  to  me ;"  and  I  slipped  the  price  of  the  lodging  into  the  po- 
liceman's hand.  He  looked  at  the  shilling — he  looked  at  me — 
he  looked  up  the  street  and  down  the  street — shook  his  head, 
and  walked  off.  I  then  approached  the  youth,  touched  him, 
and  said — "  Can  you  remember  me,  sir ;  and  what  have  you 
done  with  Mr.  Peacock  ?" 

Steaxgee  (after  a  pause). — "I  remember  you;  your  name 
is  Caxton." 

Pisisteatus. — "  And  yours  ?" 

Steaxgee. — "  Poor  devil,  if  you  ask  my  pocket — pockets, 
which  are  the  symbols  of  man ;  Dare-devil,  if  you  ask  my 
heart.  (Surveying  me  from  head  to  foot.) — The  world  seems 
to  have  smiled  on  you,  Mr.  Caxton !  Are  you  not  ashamed  to 
speak  to  a  wretch  lying  on  the  stones  ? — but,  to  be  sure,  no 
one  sees  you." 

Pisisteatus  (sententiously). — "Had  I  lived  in  the  last  cen- 
tury, I  might  have  found  Samuel  Johnson  lying  on  the  stones." 

Steaxgee  (rising). — "You  have  spoilt  my  sleep;  you  had 
a  right,  since  you  paid  for  the  lodging.  Let  me  walk  with 
you  a  few  paces ;  you  need  not  fear — I  do  not  pick  pockets — 
yet!" 

Pisisteatus. — "You  say  the  world  has  smiled  on  me;  I 
fear  it  has  frowned  on  you.  I  don't  say  '  courage,'  for  you 
seem  to  have  enough  of  that ;  but  I  say  '-patience]  which  is  the 
rarer  quality  of  the  two." 

Steaxgee. — "  Hem !"  (again  looking  at  me  keenly).  "  Why 
is  it  that  you  stop  to  speak  to  me — one  of  whom  you  know 
nothing,  or  worse  than  nothing  ?" 

Pisisteatus. — "  Because  I  have  often  thought  of  you ;  be- 
cause you  interest  me;  because — pardon  me — I  would  help 
you  if  I  can — that  is,  if  you  want  help." 

Steaxgee. — "Want!  I  am  one  want!  I  want  sleep — I 
want  food : — I  want  the  patience  you  recommend — patience  to 
starve  and  rot.  I  have  travelled  from  Paris  to  Boulogne  on 
foot,  with  twelve  sous  in  my  pocket.  Out  of  those  twelve  sous 
in  my  pocket  I  saved  four ;  with  the  four  I  went  to  a  billiard- 
room  at  Boulogne  ;  I  won  just  enough  to  pay  my  passage  and 

I 


194  Tin:  <  ax tons: 

buy  throe  rolls.  You  see  I  only  require  capital  in  order  to 
make  a  fortune.  IT  with  four  sous  I  can  win  ten  francs  in  a 
night,  what  could  I  win  with  a  capital  of  four  sovereigns,  and 
in  the  course  of  a  year? — that  is  an  application  of  the  lvule  of 
Three  which  my  head  aches  too  much  to  calculate  just  at  pres- 
ent. Well,  those  three  rolls  have  lasted  me  three  days;  the 
last  crumb  went  for  supper  last  night.  Therefore,  take  care 
how  you  offer  me  money  (for  that  is  what  men  mean  by  help). 
You  see  I  have  no  option  but  to  take  it.  But  I  warn  you, 
don't  expect  gratitude  ! — I  have  none  in  me !" 

Pisistratus. — "  You  are  not  so  bad  as  you  paint  yourself. 
I  would  do  something  more  for  you  if  I  can,  than  lend  you  the 
little  I  have  to  offer.     Will  you  be  frank  with  me  ?" 

Stranger. — "That  depends — I  have  been  frank  enough 
hitherto,  I  think." 

Pisistratus. — "  True  ;  so  I  proceed  without  scruple.  Don't 
tell  me  your  name  or  your  condition,  if  you  object  to  such  con- 
fidence; but  tell  me  if  you  have  relations  to  whom  you  can  ap- 
ply? You  shake  your  head:  well,  then,  are  you  willing  to 
work  for  yourself?  or  is  it  only  at  the  billiard-table  (pardon 
me)  that  you  can  try  to  make  four  sous  produce  ten  francs  ?" 

Stranger  (musingly). — "I  understand  you.  I  have  never 
worked  yet — I  abhor  work.  But  I  have  no  objection  to  try 
if  it  is  in  me." 

Pisistratus. — "It  is  in  you:  a  man  who  can  walk  from 
Paris  to  Boulogne  with  twelve  sous  in  his  pocket,  and  save  four 
for  a  purpose — who  can  stake  those  four  on  the  cool  confidence 
in  his  own  skill,  even  at  billiards — who  can  subsist  for  three 
days  on  three  rolls — and  who,  on  the  fourth  day,  can  wake 
from  the  stones  of  a  capital  with  an  eye  and  a  spirit  as  proud 
as  yours,  has  in  him  all  the  requisites  to  subdue  fortune." 

Stranger. — "Do  you  work? — you?" 

Pisistratus. — "  Yes — and  hard." 

Stranger. — "  I  am  ready  to  work,  then." 

Pisistratus. — "  C4ood.     Now,  what  ean  you  do  ?" 

Stejlbtgjeb  (with  his  odd  smile). — "Many  things  useful.  I 
can  split  a  bullet  on  a  penknife;  I  know  the  secret  tierce  of 
Coulon,  the  fencing-master;  I  can  speak  two  languages  (be- 
sides English)  like  a  native,  even  to  their  slang:  I  know  every 
game  in  the  cards:  I  can  ad  comedy,  tragedy,  farce:  lean 
drink  down  Bacchus  himself:  I  can  make  any  woman  I  please 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  195 

in  love  with  me — that  is,  any  woman  good-for-nothing.  Can 
I  earn  a  handsome  livelihood  out  of  all  this — wear  kid  gloves, 
and  set  up  a  cabriolet  ?     You  see  my  wishes  are  modest !" 

Pisistratus. — "  You  speak  two  languages,  you  say,  like  a 
native — French,  I  suppose,  is  one  of  them  ?" 

Stranger. — "  Yes." 

Pisistratus. — "  Will  you  teach  it  ?" 

Stranger  (haughtily). — "  No.  Je  suis  gentilhomme,  which 
means  more  or  less  than  a  gentleman.  Gentilliomme  means 
well  born,  because  free  born — teachers  are  slaves !" 

Pisistratus  (unconsciously  imitating  Mr.  Trevanion). — 
"Stuff!" 

Stranger  (looks  angry,  and  then  laughs). — "Very  true; 
stilts  don't  suit  shoes  like  these !  But  I  cannot  teach :  heaven 
help  those  I  should  teach ! — anything  else  ?" 

Pisistratus. — "  Anything  else ! — you  leave  me  a  wide  mar- 
gin. You  know  French  thoroughly — to  write  as  well  as  speak  ? 
— that  is  much.  Give  me  some  address  where  I  can  find  you 
— or  will  you  call  on  me  ?" 

Stranger. — "  No !  Any  evening  at  dusk  I  will  meet  you. 
I  have  no  address  to  give ;  and  I  cannot  show  these  rags  at  an- 
other man's  door." 

Pisistratus. — "  At  nine  in  the  evening,  then,  and  here  in  the 
Strand,  on  Thursday  next.  I  may  then  have  found  something 
that  will  suit  you.  Meanwhile — "  (slides  his  purse  into  the 
Stranger's  hand.     N.B. — Purse  not  very  full). 

Stranger,  with  the  air  of  one  conferring  a  favour,  pockets  the 
purse ;  and  there  is  something  so  striking  in  the  very  absence 
of  all  emotion  at  so  accidental  a  rescue  from  starvation,  that 
Pisistratus  exclaims — 

"  I  don't  know  why  I  should  have  taken  this  fancy  to  you, 
Mr.  Daredevil,  if  that  be  the  name  that  pleases  you  best.  The 
wood  you  are  made  of  seems  cross-grained,  and  full  of  knots ; 
and  yet,  in  the  hands  of  a  skilful  carver,  I  think  it  would  be 
worth  much." 

Stranger  (startled).  —  "Do  you?  do  you?  None,  I  be- 
lieve, ever  thought  that  before.  But  the  same  wood,  I  sup- 
pose, that  makes  the  gibbet,  could  make  the  mast  of  a  man-of- 
war.  I  tell  you,  however,  why  you  have  taken  this  fancy  to 
me — the  strong  sympathize  with  the  strong.  You,  too,  could 
subdue  fortune !" 


190  THE   CAXTONS: 

Pisistratus. — v*Stop;  if  so — if  there  is  congeniality  between 
OS,  then  Hiring  Bhould  be  reciprocal.  Come,  say  that;  for 
halt*  my  chance  of  helping  you  is  in  my  power  to  touch  your 
heart" 

Strangee  (evidently  softened). — "If  I  were  as  great  a  rogue 
as  I  ought  to  be,  my  answer  would  be  easy  enough.  As  it  is, 
I  delay  it.     Adieu.— On  Thursday." 

Stranger  vanishes  in  the  labyrinth  of  alleys  round  Leicester 
Square. 


CHAPTER  III. 

Ox  my  return  to  The  Lamb,  I  found  that  my  uncle  was  in  a 
soft  sleep  ;  and  after  a  morning  visit  from  the  surgeon,  and  his 
assurance  that  the  fever  was  fast  subsiding,  and  all  cause  for 
alarm  was  gone,  I  thought  it  necessary  to  go  back  to  Trevan- 
ion's  house,  and  explain  the  reason  for  my  night's  absence. 
But  the  family  had  not  returned  from  the  country.  Trevanion 
himself  came  up  for  a  few  hours  in  the  afternoon,  and  seemed 
to  feel  much  for  my  poor  uncle's  illness.  Though,  as  usual, 
very  busy,  he  accompanied  me  to  The  Lamb,  to  see  my  father, 
and  cheer  him  up.  Roland  still  continued  to  mend,  as  the  sur- 
geon phrased  it ;  and  as  we  went  back  to  St.  James's  Square, 
Trevanion  had  the  consideration  to  release  me  from  my  oar  in 
his  galley  for  the  next  few  days.  My  mind,  relieved  from  my 
anxiety  for  Roland,  now  turned  to  my  new  friend.  It  had  not 
been  without  an  object  that  I  had  questioned  the  young  man 
as  to  his  knowledge  of  French.  Trevanion  had  a  large  corre- 
spondence in  foreign  countries  which  was  carried  on  in  that 
language,  and  here  I  could  be  but  of  little  help  to  him.  He 
himself,  though  he  spoke  and  wrote  French  with  fluency  and 
grammatical  correctness,  wanted  that  intimate  knowledge  of 
the  most  delicate  and  diplomatic  of  all  languages  to  satisfy  his 
classical  purism.  For  Trevanion  was  a  terrible  word-t>-<  igher. 
His  taste  was  the  plague  of  my  life  and  his  own.  His  pre- 
pared speeches  (or  rather  perorations)  were  the  most  finished 
pieces  of  cold  diction  that  could  be  conceived  under  the  mar- 
ble portico  of  the  Stoics, — so  filed  and  turned,  trimmed  and 
tamed,  that  they  never  admitted  a  sentence  that  could  warm 
the  heart,  or  one  that  could  offend  the  car.  He  had  so  great 
a  horror  of  a  vulgarism  that,  like  Canning,  he  would  have  made 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  197 

a  periphrasis  of  a  couple  of  lines  to  avoid  using  f  e  word  "  cat." 
It  was  only  in  extempore  speaking  that  a  ray  of  his  real  genius 
could  indiscreetly  betray  itself.  One  may  judge  what  labour 
such  a  super-refinement  of  taste  would  inflict  upon  a  man  writ- 
ing in  a  language  not  his  own  to  some  distinguished  statesman, 
or  some  literary  institution, — knowing  that  language  just  well 
enough  to  recognize  all  the  native  elegancies  he  failed  to  attain. 
Trevanion,  at  that  very  moment,  was  employed  upon  a  statistical 
document  intended  as  a  communication  to  a  Society  at  Copen- 
hagen, of  which  he  was  an  honorary  member.  It  had  been  for 
three  weeks  the  torment  of  the  whole  house,  especially  of  poor 
Fanny  (whose  French  was  the  best  at  our  joint  disposal).  But 
Trevanion  had  found  her  phraseology  too  mincing,  too  effem- 
inate, too  much  that  of  the  boudoir.  Here,  then,  was  an  op- 
portunity to  introduce  my  new  friend,  and  test  the  capacities 
that  I  fancied  he  possessed.  I  therefore,  though  with  some 
hesitation,  led  the  subject  to  "  Remarks  on  the  Mineral  Treas- 
ures of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland"  (such  was  the  title  of  the 
work  intended  to  enlighten  the  savans  of  Denmark)  ;  and,  by 
certain  ingenious  circumlocutions,  known  to  all  able  applicants, 
I  introduced  my  acquaintance  with  a  young  gentleman  who 
possessed  the  most  familiar  and  intimate  knowledge  of  French, 
and  who  might  be  of  use  in  revising  the  manuscript.  I  knew 
enough  of  Trevanion  to  feel  that  I  could  not  reveal  the  circum- 
stances under  which  I  had  formed  that  acquaintance,  for  he  was 
much  too  practical  a  man  not  to  have  been  frightened  out  of 
his  Avits  at  the  idea  of  submitting  so  classical  a  performance  to 
so  disreputable  a  scapegrace.  As  it  was,  however,  Trevanion, 
wThose  mind  at  that  moment  was  full  of  a  thousand  other  things, 
caught  at  my  suggestion,  with  very  little  cross-questioning  on 
the  subject,  and  before  he  left  London,  consigned  the  manu- 
script to  my  charge. 

"  My  friend  is  poor,"  said  I,  timidly. 

"  Oh  !  as  to  that,"  cried  Trevanion  hastily,  "  if  it  be  a  mat- 
ter of  charity,  I  put  my  purse  in  your  hands ;  but  don't  put  my 
manuscript  in  his  !  If  it  be  a  matter  of  business,  it  is  another 
affair ;  and  I  must  judge  of  his  wTork  before  I  can  say  how 
much  it  is  worth — perhaps  nothing  !" 

So  ungracious  was  this  excellent  man  in  his  very  virtues  ! 

"  Nay,"  said  I,  "  it  is  a  matter  of  business,  and  so  we  will 
consider  it." 


198  tin-:  <  axtons  : 

"In  that  case,"  said  TrevanioD,  concluding  the  matter,  and 
buttoning  hia  pockets,  "if  I  dislike  his  wovk>  nothing ;  it"  I 
like  it.  1  wenty  guineas.  Where  are  tlie  evening  papers  V"  and 
in  another  moment  the  Member  of  Parliament  had  forgotten 
the  Btatist,  and  was  pishing  and  tutting  over  the  Globe  or  the 
Sun. 

On  Thursday,  my  uncle  was  well  enough  to  be  moved  into 
our  house  ;  and  on  the  same  evening,  I  went  forth  to  keep  my 
appointment  with  the  stranger.  The  clock  struck  nine  as  we 
met.  The  palm  of  punctuality  might  be  divided,  between  us. 
He  had  profited  by  the  interval,  since  our  last  meeting,  to  re- 
pair the  more  obvious  deficiencies  of  his  wardrobe ;  and  though 
there  was  something  still  wild,  dissolute,  outlandish,  about  his 
whole  appearance,  yet  in  the  elastic  energy  of  his  step,  and  the 
resolute  assurance  of  his  bearing,  there  was  that  which  Nature 
gives  to  her  own  aristocracy, — for,  as  far  as  my  observation 
goes,  what  has  been  called  the  "grand  air"  (and  which  is 
wholly  distinct  from  the  polish  of  manner,  or  the  urbane  grace 
of  high  breeding)  is  always  accompanied,  and  perhaps  pro- 
duced, by  two  qualities — courage,  and  the  desire  of  command. 
It  is  more  common  to  a  half-savage  nature  than  to  one  wholly 
civilized.  The  Arab  has  it,  so  has  the  American  Indian  :  and 
I  suspect  that  it  was  more  frequent  among  the  knights  and 
barons  of  the  Middle  Ages  than  it  is  among  the  polished  gen- 
tlemen of  the  modern  drawing-room. 

We  shook  hands,  and  walked  on  a  few  moments  in  silence ; 
at  length  thus  commenced  the  Steangeu, — 

"You  have  found  it  more  difficult,  I  fear,  than  you  imagined, 
to  make  the  empty  sack  stand  upright.  Considering  that  at 
least  one  third  of  those  born  to  work  cannot  find  it,  why 
should  I?" 

Pisistkati's. — "I  am  hard-hearted  enough  to  believe  that 
work  never  fails  to  those  who  seek  it  in  good  earnest.  It  was 
said  of  some  man,  famous  for  keeping  his  word,  that,  'if  lie 
had  promised  you  an  acorn,  and  all  the  oaks  in  England  foiled 
to  produce  one,  he  would  have  sent  to  Norway  for  an  acorn.' 
If  I  wanted  work,  and  there  was  none  to  be  had  in  the  Old 
World,  T  would  hud  my  Way  to  the  New.  But,  to  the  point: 
I  havt  found  something  for  you,  which  I  do  not  think  your 
taste  will  oppose,  and  which  may  open  to  you  the  means  of  an 
honorable  independence.  Bui  I  cannot  well  explain  it  in  the 
eete     when  shall  m  _"  .- 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  199 

Straxger  (after  some  hesitation). — "I  have  a  lodging  near 
here,  which  I  need  not  blush  to  take  you  to — I  mean,  that  it  is 
not  among  rogues  and  cast-aways." 

Pisistratus  (much  pleased,  and  taking  the  stranger's  arm). 
— "  Come,  then." 

Pisistratus  and  the  stranger  pass  over  Waterloo  Bridge,  and 
pause  before  a  small  house  of  respectable  appearance.  Stran- 
ger admits  them  both  with  a  latch-key — leads  the  way  to  the 
third  story — strikes  a  light,  and  does  the  honours  to  a  small 
chamber,  clean  and  orderly.  Pisistratus  explains  the  task  to 
be  done,  and  opens  the  manuscript.  The  stranger  draws  his 
chair  deliberately  towards  the  light,  and  rims  his  eye  rapidly 
over  the  pages.  Pisistratus  trembles  to  see  him  pause  before 
a  long  array  of  figures  and  calculations.  Certainly  it  does  not 
look  inviting ;  but,  pshaw !  it  is  scarcely  a  part  of  the  task 
which  limits  itself  to  the  mere  correction  of  words. 

Stranger  (briefly). — "There  must  be  a  mistake  here — stay! 
I  see — "  (He  turns  back  a  few  pages,  and  corrects  with  rapid 
precision  an  error  in  a  somewhat  complicated  and  abstruse 
calculation.) 

Pisistratus  (surprised). — "You  seem  a  notable  arithmeti- 
cian." 

Straxger. — "  Did  I  not  tell  you  that  I  was  skilful  in  all 
games  of  mingled  skill  and  chance  ?  It  requires  an  arithmet- 
ical head  for  that :  a  first-rate  card-player  is  a  financier  spoilt. 
I  am  certain  that  you  never  could  find  a  man  fortunate  on  the 
turf,  or  at  the  gaming-table,  who  had  not  an  excellent  head  for 
figures.  Well,  this  French  is  good  enough  apparently ;  there 
are  but  a  few  idioms,  here  and  there,  that,  strictly  speaking, 
are  more  English  than  French.  But  the  whole  is  a  work 
scarce  worth  paying  for !" 

Pisistratus. — "  The  work  of  the  head  fetches  a  price  not 
proportioned  to  the  quantity,  but  the  quality.  When  shall  I 
call  for  this  ?" 

Straxger. — "  To-morrow."  (And  he  puts  the  manuscript 
away  in  a  drawer.) 

We  then  conversed  on  various  matters  for  nearly  an  hour ; 
and  my  impression  of  this  young  man's  natural  ability  was 
confirmed  and  heightened.  But  it  was  an  ability  as  wrong 
and  perverse  in  its  directions  or  instincts  as  a  French  novel- 
ist'-,    He  seemed  to  have,  to  a  high  degree,  the  harder  por- 


•JoO  im;  CAXTONS: 

tion  of  tho  reasoning  faculty,  but  to  be  almost  wholly  without 
that  arch  beautifier  of  character,  that  sweet  purifier  of  mere 
intellect  —  tfu  imagination.  For,  though  we  are  too  much 
taught  to  be  on  our  guard  against  imagination,  I  hold  it,  with 
Captain  Roland,  to  be  the  divinest  kind  of  reason  we  possess, 
and  the  one  that  leads  us  the  least  astray.  In  youth,  indeed, 
it  occasions  errors,  but  they  are  not  of  a  sordid  and  debasing 
nature.  Newton  says  that  one  final  effect  of  the  comets  is  to 
recruit  the  seas  and  the  planets  by  a  condensation  of  the  va- 
pours and  exhalations  therein  ;  and  so  even  the  erratic  flashes 
of  an  imagination  really  healthful  and  vigorous  deepen  our 
knowledge  and  brighten  our  lights ;  they  recruit  our  seas  and 
our  stars.  Of  such  flashes  my  new  friend  was  as  innocent  as 
the  sternest  matter-of-fact  person  could  desire.  Fancies  he 
had  in  profusion,  and  very  bad  ones  ;  but  of  imagination  not  a 
scintilla  !  His  mind  w^as  one  of  those  which  live  in  a  prison 
of  logic,  and  cannot,  or  will  not,  see  beyond  the  bars :  such  a 
nature  is  at  once  positive  and  sceptical.  This  boy  had  thought 
proper  to  decide  at  once  on  the  numberless  complexities  of 
the  social  world  from  his  own  harsh  experience.  With  him 
the  whole  system  was  a  war  and  a  cheat.  If  the  universe 
were  entirely  composed  of  knaves,  he  would  be  sure  to  have 
made  his  way.  NowT  this  bias  of  mind,  alike  shrewd  and  un- 
amiable,  might  be  safe  enough  if  accompanied  by  a  lethargic 
temper ;  but  it  threatened  to  become  terrible  and  dangerous 
in  one  who,  in  default  of  imagination,  possessed  abundance  of 
passion :  and  this  was  the  case  writh  the  young  outcast.  Pas- 
sion, in  him,  comprehended  many  of  the  worst  emotions  which 
militate  against  human  happiness.  You  could  not  contradict 
him,  but  you  raised  quick  choler ;  you  could  not  speak  of 
wealth,  but  the  cheek  paled  with  gnawing  envy.  The  aston- 
ishing natural  advantages  of  this  poor  boy — his  beauty,  his 
readiness,  the  daring  spirit  that  breathed  around  him  like  a 
fiery  atmosphere — had  raised  his  constitutional  self-confidence 
into  an  arrogance  that  turned  his  very  claims  to  admiration 
into  prejudices  against  him.  Irascible,  envious,  arrogant — bad 
enough,  but  not  the  worst,  for  these  salient  angles  were  all 
varnished  over  with  a  cold  repellant  cynicism — his  passions 
vented  themselves  in  sneers.  There  seemed  in  him  no  moral 
susceptibility  ;  and,  what  was  inore  remarkable  in  a  proud  na- 
ture, little  or  nothing  of  the  true  point  of  honour.     He  had.  to 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  201 

a  morbid  excess,  that  desire  to  rise,  which  is  vulgarly  called 
ambition,  but  no  apparent  wish  for  fame,  or  esteem,  or  the 
love  of  his  species;  on]y  the  hard  wish  to  succeed,  not  shine, 
not  serve, — succeed,  that  he  might  have  the  right  to  despise  a 
world  which  galled  his  self-conceit,  and  enjoy  the  pleasures 
which  the  redundant  nervous  life  in  him  seemed  to  crave. 
Such  were  the  more  patent  attributes  of  a  character  that,  omin- 
ous as  it  was,  yet  interested  me,  and  yet  appeared  to  me  to  be 
redeemable, — nay,  to  have  in  it  the  rude  elements  of  a  certain 
greatness.  Ought  we  not  to  make  something  great  out  of  a 
youth  under  twenty,  who  has,  in  the  highest  degree,  quickness 
to  conceive  and  courage  to  execute  ?  On  the  other  hand,  all 
faculties  that  can  make  greatness,  contain  those  that  can  attain 
goodness.  In  the  savage  Scandinavian,  or  the  ruthless  Frank, 
lay  the  germs  of  a  Sydney  or  a  Bayard.  What  would  the 
best  of  us  be,  if  we  were  suddenly  placed  at  war  with  the 
whole  world?  And  this  fierce  spirit  was  at  war  with  the 
whole  world — a  war  self-sought,  perhaps,  but  it  was  war  not 
the  less.  You  must  surround  the  savage  with  peace,  if  you 
want  the  virtues  of  peace. 

I  cannot  say  that  it  was  in  a  single  interview  and  conference 
that  I  came  to  these  convictions;  but  I  am  rather  summing 
up  the  impressions  which  I  received  as  I  saw  more  of  this  per- 
son, whose  destiny  I  presumed  to  take  under  my  charge. 

In  going  away,  I  said,  "  But,  at  all  events,  you  have  a  name 
in  your  lodgings:  whom  am  I  to  ask  for  when  I  call  to- 
morrow ?" 

"  Oh,  you  may  know  my  name  now,"  said  he,  smiling ;  "  it 
is  Vivian — Francis  Vivian." 


CHAPTER  IV. 

I  eemember  one  morning,  when  a  boy,  loitering  by  an  old 
wall,  to  watch  the  operations  of  a  garden  spider,  whose  web 
seemed  to  be  in  great  request.  When  I  first  stopped,  she  was 
engaged  very  quietly  with  a  fly  of  the  domestic  species,  whom 
she  managed  with  ease  and  dignity.  But  just  when  she  was 
most  interested  in  that  absorbing  employment,  came  a  couple 
of  May-flies,  and  then  a  gnat,  and  then  a  blue-bottle, — all  at 
different  angles  of  the  web.     Never  was  a  poor  spider  so  dis- 

12 


202  THE  <  \ \ tons: 

traoted  bv  her  good  fortune!  She  evidently  did  not  know 
which  godsend  to  take  first.  The  aboriginal  victim  being  re- 
leased, Bhe  slid  half-way  towards  the  May-flies;  then  one  of 
her  eight  eye-  caught  sight  of  the  blue-bottle!  and  she  shot 
off  in  thai  direction : — when  the  hum  of  the  gnat  again  divert- 
ed her;  and  in  the  middle  of  this  perplexity,  pounce  came  a 
young  wasp  in  a  violent  passion!  Then  the  spider  evidently 
lost  her  presence  of  mind ;  she  became  clean  demented ;  and 
a  tier  standing,  stupid  and  stock-still,  in  the  middle  of  her 
meshes,  for'a  minute  or  two,  she  ran  off  to  her  hole  as  fast  as 
she  could  run,  and  left  her  guests  to  shift  for  themselves.  I 
confess  that  I  am  somewhat  in  the  dilemma  of  the  attractive 
and  amiable  insect  I  have  just  described.  I  got  on  well  enough 
while  I  had  only  my  domestic  fly  to  see  after.  But  now  that 
there  is  something  fluttering  at  every  eud  of  my.net  (and 
especially  since  the  advent  of  that  passionate  young  wasp,  who 
is  fuming  and  buzzing  in  the  nearest  corner !)  I  am  fairly  at  a 
loss  which  I  should  first  grapple  with — and  alas !  unlike  the 
spider,  I  have  no  hole  where  I  can  hide  myself,  and  let  the 
web  do  the  weaver's  work.  But  I  will  imitate  the  spider  as 
far  as  I  can ;  and  while  the  rest  hum  and  struggle  away  their 
impatient,  unnoticed  hour,  I  will  retreat  into  the  inner  laby- 
rinth of  my  own  life. 

The  illness  of  my  uncle,  and  my  renewed  acquaintance  with 
Vivian,  had  naturally  sufliced  to  draw  my  thoughts  from  the 
rash  and  unpropitious  love  I  had  conceived  for  Fanny  Trevan- 
ion.  During  the  absence  of  the  family  from  London  (and  they 
stayed  some  time  longer  than  had  been  expected),  I  had  leisure, 
however,  to  recall  my  father's  touching  history,  and  the  moral 
it  had  so  obviously  preached  to  me;  and  I  formed  so  many 
good  resolutions,  that  it  was  with  an  untrembling  hand  that  I 
welcomed  Miss  Trevanion  at  last  to  London,  and  with  a  firm 
heart  that  I  avoided,  as  much  as  possible,  the  fatal  charm  of 
her  society.  The  slow  convalescence  of  my  uncle  gave  me  a 
just  excuse  to  discontinue  our  rides.  What  time  Trevanion 
-pared  me,  it  was  natural  that  I  should  spend  with  my  family. 
1  went  to  no  balls  nor  parties.  I  even  absented  myself  from 
Trevanion's  periodical  dinners.  Miss  Trevanion  at  first  rallied 
me  on  my  seclusion,  with  her  usual  lively  malice.  But  I  con- 
tinued worthily  to  complete  my  martyrdom.  I  took  care  that 
no  reproachful  look  at  the  gaiety  that  wrung  my  soul  should 


A   FAMILY   PICTUKE.  203 

s 

betray  my  secret.  Then  Fanny  seemed  either  hurt  or  disdain- 
ful, and  avoided  altogether  entering  her  father's  study :  all  at 
once  she  changed  her  tactics,  and  was  seized  with  a  strange 
desire  for  knowledge,  which  brought  her  into  the  room  to  look 
for  a  book,  or  ask  a  question,  ten  times  a  day.  I  was  proof  to 
all.  But,  to  speak  truth,  I  was  profoundly  wretched.  Look- 
ing back  now,  I  am  dismayed  at  the  remembrance  of  my  own 
sufferings;  my  health  became  seriously  affected;  I  dreaded 
alike  the  trial  of  the  day  and  the  anguish  of  the  night.  My 
only  distractions  were  in  my  visits  to  Vivian,  and  my  escape 
to  the  dear  circle  of  home.  And  that  home  was  my  safeguard 
and  preservative  in  that  crisis  of  my  life ;  its  atmosphere  of 
unpretending  honour  and  serene  virtue  strengthened  all  my 
resolutions ;  it  braced  me  for  my  struggles  against  the  stron- 
gest passion  which  youth  admits,  and  counteracted  the  evil  va- 
pours of  that  air  in  which  Vivian's  envenomed  spirit  breathed 
and  moved.  Without  the  influence  of  such  a  home,  if  I  had 
succeeded  in  the  conduct  that  probity  enjoined  towards  those 
in  whose  house  I  was  a  trusted  guest,  I  do  not  think  I  could 
have  resisted  the  contagion  of  that  malign  and  morbid  bitter- 
ness against  fate  and  the  world,  which  love,  thwarted  by  for- 
tune, is  too  inclined  of  itself  to  conceive,  and  in  the  expression 
of  which  Vivian  was  not  without  the  eloquence  which  belongs 
to  earnestness,  whether  in  truth  or  falsehood.  But,  somehow 
or  other,  I  never  left  the  little  room  that  contained  the  grand 
suffering  in  the  face  of  the  veteran  soldier,  whose  lip,  often 
quivering  with  anguish,  was  never  heard  to  murmur ;  and  the 
tranquil  wisdom  which  had  succeeded  my  father's  early  trials 
(trials  like  my  own),  and  the  loving  smile  on  my  mother's  ten- 
der face,  and  the  innocent  childhood  of  Blanche  (by  which 
name  the  Elf  had  familiarized  herself  to  us),  whom  I  already 
loved  as  a  sister, — without  feeling  that  those  four  walls  con- 
tained enough  to  sweeten  the  world,  had  it  been  filled  to  its 
capacious  brini  with  gall  and  hyssop. 

Trevanion  had  been  more  than  satisfied  with  Vivian's  per- 
formance— he  had  been  struck  with  it.  For  though  the  cor- 
rections in  the  mere  phraseology  had  been  very  limited,  they 
went  beyond  verbal  amendments — they  suggested  such  words 
as  improved  the  thoughts ;  and,  besides  that  notable  correc- 
tion of  an  arithmetical  error,  which  Trevanion's  mind  was 
formed  to  over-appreciate,  one  or  two  brief  annotations  on  the 


204  iii  i :  <  avion*  : 

margin  were  boldly  hazarded,  prompting  some  stronger  link 
in  a  chain  of  reasoning,  or  indicating  the  necessity  for  some 
farther  evidence  in  the  assertion  of  a  statement.  And  all  this 
from  the  mere  natural  and  naked  logic  of  an  acute  mind,  un- 
aided by  the  smallest  knowledge  of  the  subject  treated  of! 
Trevanion  threw  quite  enough  work  into  Vivian's  hands,  and 
at  a  remuneration  sufficiently  liberal  to  realize  my  promise  of 
an  independence.  And  more  than  once  he  asked  me  to  intro- 
duce to  him  my  friend.  But  this  I  continued  to  elude — heav- 
en knows,  not  from  jealousy,  but  simply  because  I  feared  that 
Vivian's  manner  and  way  of  talk  would  singularly  displease 
one  wdio  detested  presumption,  and  understood  no  eccentrici- 
ties but  his  own. 

Still,  Vivian,  whose  industry  was  of  a  strong  wing,  but  only 
for  short  flights,  had  not  enough  to  employ  more  than  a  few 
hours  of  his  day,  and  I  dreaded  lest  he  should,  from  very  idle- 
ness, fall  back  into  old  habits,  and  re-seek  old  friendships.  His 
cynical  candour  allowed  that  both  were  sufficiently  disreputa- 
ble to  justify  grave  apprehensions  of  such  a  result ;  according- 
ly, I  contrived  to  find  leisure  in  my  evenings  to  lessen  his  en- 
nui, by  accompanying  him  in  rambles  through  the  gas-lit 
streets,  or  occasionally,  for  an  hour  or  so,  to  one  of  the  the- 
atres. 

Vivian's  first  care,  on  finding  himself  rich  enough,  had  been 
bestowed  on  his  person  ;  and  those  two  faculties  of  observa- 
tion and  imitation  which  minds  so  ready  always  eminently 
possess,  had  enabled  him  to  achieve  that  graceful  neatness  of 
costume  peculiar  to  the  English  gentleman.  For  the  first  few 
days  of  his  metamorphosis,  traces  indeed  of  a  constitutional 
Love  of  show,  or  vulgar  companionship,  were  noticeable;  but 
one  by  one  they  disappeared.  First  went  a  gaudy  neck-cloth, 
with  collars  turned  down  ;  then  a  pair  of  spurs  vanished  ;  and 
last  1  y,  a  diabolical  instrument  that  he  called  a  cane — but  which, 
by  means  of  a  running  bullet,  could  serve  as  a  bludgeon  at  one 
end,  and  concealed  a  dagger  in  the  other — subsided  into  the 
ordinary  walking-stick  adapted  to  our  peaceable  metropolis. 
A  similar  change,  though  in  a  less  degree,  gradually  took  place 
in  his  manner  and  Ins  conversation.  He  grew  less  abrupt  in 
the  oik',  and  more  calm, perhaps  more  cheerful,in  the  other. 
It  was  evident  thai  he  was  not  insensible  to  the  elevated  pleas- 
are  of  providing  for  himself  by  praiseworthy  exertion — of  feel- 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  205 

ing  for  the  first  time  that  his  intellect  was  of  use  to  him,  credit- 
ably. A  new  world,  though  still  dim — seen  through  mist  and 
fog — began  to  dawn  upon  him. 

Such  is  the  vanity  of  us  poor  mortals,  that  my  interest  in 
Vivian  was  probably  increased,  and  my  aversion  to  much  in 
him  materially  softened,  by  observing  that  I  had  gained  a  sort 
of  ascendency  over  his  savage  nature.  When  we  had  first  met 
by  the  roadside,  and  afterwards  conversed  in  the  churchyard, 
the  ascendency  was  certainly  not  on  my  side.  But  I  now  came 
from  a  larger  sphere  of  society  than  that  in  which  he  had  yet 
moved.  I  had  seen  and  listened  to  the  first  men  in  England. 
What  had  then  dazzled  me  only,  now  moved  my  pity.  On  the 
other  hand,  his  active  mind  could  not  but  observe  the  change 
in  me ;  and,  whether  from  envy  or  a  better  feeling,  he  was  will- 
ing to  learn  from  me  how  to  eclipse  me,  and  resume  his  earlier 
superiority — not  to  be  superior  chafed  him.  Thus  he  listened 
to  me  with  docility  when  I  pointed  out  the  books  which  con- 
nected themselves  with  the  various  subjects  incidental  to  the 
miscellaneous  matters  on  which  he  was  employed.  Though  he 
had  less  of  the  literary  turn  of  mind  than  any  one  equally  clev- 
er I  had  ever  met,  and  had  read  little,  considering  the  quantity 
of  thought  he  had  acquired,  and  the  show  he  made  of  the  few 
works  with  which  he  had  voluntarily  made  himself  familiar,  he 
yet  resolutely  sate  himself  down  to  study ;  and  though  it  was 
clearly  against  the  grain,  I  augured  the  more  favourably  from 
tokens  of  a  determination  to  do  what  was  at  the  present  irk- 
some for  a  purpose  in  the  future.  Yet,  whether  I  should  have 
approved  the  purpose  had  I  thoroughly  understood  it,  is  an- 
other question  !  There  were  abysses,  both  in  his  past  life  and 
in  his  character,  which  I  could  not  penetrate.  There  was  in 
him  both  a  reckless  frankness  and  a  vigilant  reserve :  his  frank- 
ness was  apparent  in  his  talk  on  all  matters  immediately  before 
us  ;  in  the  utter  absence  of  all  effort  to  make  himself  seem  bet- 
ter than  he  was.  His  reserve  was  equally  shown  in  the  ingen- 
ious evasion  of  every  species  of  confidence  that  could  admit 
me  into  such  secrets  of  his  life  as  he  chose  to  conceal :  where 
he  had  been  born,  reared,  and  educated ;  how  he  came  to  be 
thrown  on  his  own  resources ;  how  he  had  contrived,  how  he 
had  subsisted,  were  all  matters  on  which  he  had  seemed  to  take 
an  oath  to  Harpocrates,  the  god  of  silence.  And  yet  he  was 
full  of  anecdotes  of  what  he  had  seen,  of  strange  companions 


206  mi:  <  \\to\s  : 

whom  he  never  Darned,  but  with  whom  he  had  been  thrown. 
And,  to  do  him  justice,  I  remarked  that,  though  his  precocious 
experience  seemed  to  have  been  gathered  from  the  holes  and 
corners,  the  sewers  and  drains  of  life,  and  though  he  seemed 
wholly  without  dislike  to  dishonesty,  and  to  regard  virtue  *or 
rice  with  as  serene  an  indifference  as  some  grand  poet  who 
views  them  both  merely  as  ministrants  to  his  art,  yet  he  never 
betrayed  any  positive  breach  of  honesty  in  himself.  lie  could 
laugh  over  the  story  of  some  ingenious  fraud  that  he  had  wit- 
nessed, and  seem  insensible  to  its  turpitude;  but  he  spoke  of  it 
in  the  tone  of  an  approving  witness,  not  of  an  actual  accom- 
plice. As  we  grew  more  intimate,  he  felt  gradually,  however, 
that  pudor,  or  instinctive  shame,  which  the  contact  with  minds 
habituated  to  the  distinctions  between  wrong  and  right  un- 
consciously produces,  and  such  stories  ceased.  He  never  but 
once  mentioned  his  family,  and  that  was  in  the  following  odd 
and  abrupt  manner  : — 

"  Ah !"  cried  he  one  day,  stopping  suddenly  before  a  print- 
shop,  "  how  that  reminds  me  of  my  dear,  dear  mother." 

tw  Which  ?"  said  I  eagerly,  puzzled  between  an  engraving  of 
Raffaelle's  "Madonna,"  and  another  of  "The  Brigand's  Wife." 

Vivian  did  not  satisfy  my  curiosity,  but  drew  me  on  in  spite 
of  my  reluctance. 

"  You  loved  your  mother,  then  ?"  said  I,  after  a  pause. 

"  Yes,  as  a  whelp  may  a  tigress." 

"  That's  a  strange  comparison." 

"  Or  a  bull-dog  may  the  prize-fighter,  his  master !  Do  you 
like  that  better?" 

"  Not  much  ;  is  it  a  comparison  your  mother  would  like  ?" 

"  Like  ? — she  is  dead !"  said  he,  rather  falteringly. 

T  pressed  his  arm  closer  to  mine. 

UT  understand  you,"  said  he,  with  his  cynic  repellant  smile. 
"  But  you  do  wrong  to  feel  for  my  loss.  I  feel  for  it ;  but  no 
(me  who  cares  for  me  should  sympathize  with  my  grief." 

"Why?" 

"  Because  my  mother  was  not  what  the  world  would  call  a 
good  woman.  I  did  not  love  her  the  less  for  that.  And  now 
lei  a-  change  the  subject." 

"Nay;  since  you  have  said  so  much,  Vivian,  let  me  coax 

you  1'»  say  on.      Is  no1  your  father  living?" 

"Is  not  the  Monument  standing?" 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  207 

"  I  suppose  so  ;  what  of  that  ?" 

"  Why,  it  matters  very  little  to  either  of  us ;  and  my  ques- 
tions answers  yours !" 

I  could  not  get  on  after  this,  and  I  never  did  get  on  a  step 
farther.  I  must  own  that  if  Vivian  did  not  impart  his  confi- 
dence liberally,  neither  did  he  seek  confidence  inquisitively 
from  me.  He  listened  with  interest  if  I  spoke  of  Trevanion 
(for  I  told  him  frankly  of  my  connection  with  that  personage, 
though  you  may  be  sure  that  I  said  nothing  of  Fanny),  and  of 
the  brilliant  world  that  my  residence  with  one  so  distinguished 
opened  to  me.  But  if  ever,  in  the  fulness  of  my  heart,  I  began 
to  speak  of  my  parents,  of  my  home,  he  evinced  either  so  im- 
pertinent an  e?imd,  or  assumed  so  chilling  a  sneer,  that  I  usu- 
ally hurried  away  from  him,  as  well  as  the  subject,  in  indignant 
disgust.  Once  especially,  when  I  asked  him  to  let  me  intro- 
duce him  to  my  father — a  point  on  which  I  was  really  anxious, 
for  I  thought  it  impossible  but  that  the  devil  within  him  would 
be  softened  by  the  contact — he  said,  with  his  low,  scornful 
laugh — 

"  My  dear  Caxton,  when  I  was  a  child,  I  was  so  bored  with 
4  Telemachus,'  that,  in  order  to  endure  it,  I  turned  it  into  trav- 
esty." 

"Well?" 

"  Are  you  not  afraid  that  the  same  wicked  disposition  might 
make  a  caricature  of  your  Ulysses  ?" 

I  did  not  see  Mr.  Vivian  for  three  days  after  that  speech ; 
and  I  should  not  have  seen  him  then,  only  we  met  by  accident, 
under  the  Colonnade  of  the  Opera-House.  Vivian  was  leaning 
against  one  of  the  columns,  and  watching  the  long  procession 
which  swept  to  the  only  temple  in  vogue  that  Art  has  retained 
in  the  English  Babel.  Coaches  and  chariots,  blazoned  with 
arms  and  coronets — cabriolets  (the  brougham  had  not  then  re- 
placed them)  of  sober  hue,  but  exquisite  appointment,  with  gi- 
gantic horses  and  pigmy  "  tigers,"  dashed  on,  and  rolled  off 
before  him.  Fair  women  and  gay  dresses,  stars  and  ribbons — 
the  rank  and  the  beauty  of  the  patrician  world — passed  him  by. 
And  I  could  not  resist  the  compassion  with  which  this  lonely, 
friendless,  eager,  discontented  spirit  inspired  me — gazing  on 
that  gorgeous  existence  in  which  it  fancied  itself  formed  to 
shine,  with  the  ardour  of  desire  and  the  despair  of  exclusion. 
By  one  glimpse  of  that  dark  countenance,  I  read  what  was 


208  THE   CAXTONS: 

passing  within  the  ye1  darker  heart.  The  emotion  might  not 
be  amiable,  Aor  the  thoughts  wise,  ye1  were  they  unnatural? 
I  had  experienced  something  of  them — not  at  the  sight  of  gay- 
dressed  people,  of  wealth  and  idleness,  pleasure  and  fashion; 
but  when,  at  the  doors  of  Parliament,  men  who  have  won  no- 
ble  names,  and  whose  word  had  weight  on  the  destinies  of  glo- 
rious England,  brushed  heedlessly  by  to  their  grand  arena  ;  or 
when,  amidst  the  holiday  crowd  of  ignoble  pomp,  I  had  heard 
the  murmur  of  fame  buzz  and  gather  round  some  lordly  la- 
bourer in  art  or  letters :  that  contrast  between  glory  so  near, 
and  yet  so  for,  and  one's  own  obscurity,  of  course  I  had  felt  it 
— who  has  not  ?  Alas  !  many  a  youth  not  fated  to  be  a  Themis- 
tocles,  will  yet  feel  that  the  trophies  of  a  Miltiades  will  not 
suffer  him  to  sleep  !  So  I  went  up  to  Vivian  and  laid  my  hand 
on  his  shoulder. 

"Ah!"  said  he,  more  gently  than  usual,  "I  am  glad  to  see 
you,  and  to  apologize — I  offended  you  the  other  day.  But  you 
would  not  get  very  gracious  answers  from  souls  in  purgatory 
if  you  talked  to  them  of  the  happiness  of  heaven.  Never  speak 
to  me  about  homes  and  fathers !  Enough !  I  see  you  forgive 
me.     Why  are  you  not  going  to  the  opera  ?     You  can  ?" 

"  And  you  too,  if  you  so  please.  A  ticket  is  shamefully  dear, 
to  be  sure ;  still,  if  you  are  fond  of  music,  it  is  a  luxury  you  can 
afford." 

"  Oh,  you  flatter  me  if  you  fancy  the  prudence  of  saving 
withholds  me !  I  did  go  the  other  night,  but  I  shall  not  go 
again.    Music  ! — when  you  go  to  the  opera,  is  it  for  the  music?" 

"  Only  partially,  I  own :  the  lights,  the  scene,  the  pageant, 
attract  me  quite  as  much.  But  I  do  not  think  the  opera  a 
very  profitable  pleasure  for  either  of  us.  For  rich  idle  people, 
I  dare  say,  it  may  be  as  innocent  an  amusement  as  any  other, 
but  I  find  it  a  sad  enervator." 

"And  I  just  the  reverse — a  horrible  stimulant!  Caxton, 
do  you  know  that,  ungracious  as  it  will  sound  to  you,  I  am 
growing  impatient  of  this  'honourable  independence!'  AVliat 
does  it  lead  to? — board,  clothes,  and  lodging, — can  it  ever 
bring  me  anything  more?" 

w-  Al  first,  Vivian,  you  limited  your  aspirations  to  kid  gloves 
and  a  cabriolel  :  it  has  brought  the  kid  gloves  already;  by- 
and-by  it  will  bring  the  cabriolet  !" 

••Oiii-  wishes  grow  by  what  they  feed  on.     You  live  in  the 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  209 

great  world — you  can  have  excitement  if  you  please  it — I  want 
excitement,  I  want  the  world,  I  want  room  for  my  mind,  man ! 
Do  you  understand  me  ?" 

"  Perfectly — and  sympathize  with  you,  my  poor  Vivian ;  but 
it  will  all  come.  Patience,  as  I  preached  to  you  while  dawn 
rose  so  comfortless  over  the  streets  of  London.  You  are  not 
losing  time  ;  fill  up  your  mind ;  read,  study,  fit  yourself  for  am- 
bition. Why  wish  to  fly  till  you  have  got  your  wings  ?  Live 
in  books  now :  after  all,  they  are  splendid  j^alaces,  and  open  to 
us  all,  rich  and  poor." 

"  Books,  books ! — ah !  you  are  the  son  of  a  bookman.  It  is 
not  by  books  that  men  get  on  in  the  world,  and  enjoy  fife  in 
the  meanwhile." 

"  I  don't  know  that ;  but,  my  good  fellow,  you  want  to  do 
both — get  on  in  the  world  as  fast  as  labour  can,  and  enjoy  life 
as  pleasantly  as  indolence*  may.  You  want  to  live  like  the  but- 
terfly, and  yet  have  all  the  honey  of  the  bee  ;  and,  what  is  the 
very  deuce  of  the  whole,  even  as  the  butterfly,  you  ask  every 
flower  to  grow  up  in  a  moment ;  and,  as  a  bee,  the  whole  hive 
must  be  stored  hi  a  quarter  of  an  hour !  Patience,  patience, 
patience." 

Vivian  sighed  a  fierce  sigh.  "  I  suppose,"  said  he,  after  an 
unquiet  pause,  "that  the  vagrant  and  the  outlaw  are  strong 
in  me,  for  I  long  to  run  back  to  my  own  existence,  which  was 
all  action,  and  therefore  allowed  no  thought." 

"While  he  thus  said,  we  had  wandered  round  the  Colon- 
nade, and  were  in  that  narrow  passage  in  which  is  situated 
the  more  private  entrance  to  the  opera :  close  by  the  doors  of 
that  entrance,  two  or  three  young  men  were  lounging.  As 
Vivian  ceased,  the  voice  of  one  of  these  loungers  came  lauo-h- 
ingly  to  our  ears. 

"  Oh !"  it  said,  apparently  in  answer  to  some  question,  "  I 
have  a  much  quicker  way  to  fortune  than  that;  I  mean  to 
marry  an  heiress !" 

Vivian  started,  and  looked  at  the  speaker.  He  was  a  very 
good-looking  fellow.  Vivian  continued  to  look  at  him,  and 
deliberately,  from  head  to  foot ;  he  then  turned  away  with  a 
satisfied  and  thoughtful  smile. 

"Certainly,"  said  I,  gravely  (construing  the  smile),  "you 
are  right  there ;  you  are  even  better-looking  than  that  heiress- 
hunter  !" 


210  I  be  caztonb: 

Vivian  coloured;  but  before  ho  could  answer,  one  of  the 
Loungers,  as  the  group  recovered  from  the  gay  laugh  which 
their  companion's  easy  coxcombry  had  excited,  said, — 

"Then,  by  the  way,  if  you  want  an  heiress,  here  comes  one 
of  the  greatest  in  England;  but  instead  of  being  a  younger 
son,  with  three  good  lives  between  you  and  an  Irish  peerage, 
one  ought  to  be  an  earl,  at  least,  to  aspire  to  Fanny  Trevanion !" 

The  name  thrilled  through  me — I  felt  myself  tremble ;  and, 
looking  up,  I  saw  Lady  Ellinor  and  Miss  Trevanion,  as  they 
hurried  from  their  carriage  towards  the  entrance  of  the  oj^era. 
They  both  recognized  me,  and  Fanny  cried, — 

"  You  here !  How  fortunate !  You  must  see  us  into  the 
box,  even  if  you  run  away  the  moment  after." 

"  But  I  am  not  dressed  for  the  opera,"  said  I,  embarrassed. 

"  And  why  not  ?"  asked  Miss  Trevanion ;  then,  dropping 
her  voice,  she  added,  "  Why  do  you  desert  us  so  wilfully  ?" — 
and,  leaning  her  hand  on  my  arm,  I  was  drawn  irresistibly 
into  the  lobby.  The  young  loungers  at  the  door  made  way 
for  us,  and  eyed  me,  no  doubt,  with  envy. 

"  Nay!"  said  I,  affecting  to  laugh,  as  I  saw  Miss  Trevanion 
waited  for  my  reply.  "You  forget  how  little  time  I  have  for 
sueh  amusements  now — and  my  uncle — " 

"  Oh,  but  mamma  and  I  have  been  to  see  your  uncle  to-day, 
and  he  is  nearly  well — is  he  not,  mamma?  I  cannot  tell  you 
how  I  like  and  admire  him.  He  is  just  what  I  fancy  a  Doug- 
las of  the  old  day.  But  mamma  is  impatient.  Well,  you  must 
dine  with  us  to-morrow — promise ! — not  adieu,  but  au  revoir" 
and  Fanny  glided  to  her  mother's  arm.  Lady  Ellinor,  always 
kind  and  courteous  to  me,  had  good-naturedly  lingered  till 
this  dialogue,  or  rather  monologue,  was  over. 

On  returning  to  the  passage,  I  found  Vivian  walking  to  and 
fro  ;  he  had  lighted  his  cigar,  and  was  smoking  energetically. 

"  So  this  great  heiress,"  said  he,  smiling,  "  who,  as  far  as  I 
could  see — under  her  hood — seems  no  less  fair  than  rich,  is  the 
daughter,  I  presume,  of  the  Mr.  Trevanion  whose  effusions  you 
so  kindly  submit  to  me.  He  is  very  rich,  then?  You  never 
-aid  so,  yet  I  ought  to  have  known  it:  but  you  see  I  know 
nothing  of  your  beau  monde — not  even  that  Miss  Trevanion  is 
one  of  the  greatest  heiresses  in  England." 

"  Yes,  Mr.  Trevanion  is  rich,"  said  I,  repressing  a  sigh — 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  211 

"  And  you  are  his  secretary !  My  dear  friend,  you  may 
well  offer  me  patience,  for  a  large  stock  of  yours  will,  I  hope, 
be  superfluous  to  you." 

"  I  don't  understand  you." 

"Yet  you  heard  that  young  gentleman,  as  well  as  myself; 
and  you  are  in  the  same  house  as  the  heiress." 

"  Vivian !" 

"  Well,  what  have  I  said  so  monstrous  ?" 

"  Pooh !  since  you  refer  to  that  young  gentleman,  you  heard, 
too,  what  his  companion  told  him, — '  one  ought  to  be  an  earl, 
at  least,  to  aspire  to  Fanny  Trevanion !'  " 

"Tut!  as  well  say  that  one  ought  to  be  a  millionaire  to 
aspire  to  a  million ! — yet  I  believe  those  who  make  millions 
generally  begin  with  pence." 

"That  belief  should  be  a  comfort  and  encouragement  to 
you,  Vivian.     And  now,  good-night, — I  have  much  to  do." 

"  Good-night,  then,"  said  Vivian,  and  we  parted. 

I  made  my  way  to  Mr.  Trevanion's  house,  and  to  the  study. 
There  was  a  formidable  arrear  of  business  waiting  for  me,  and 
I  sate  down  to  it  at  first  resolutely ;  but  by  degrees  I  found 
my  thoughts  wandering  from  the  eternal  blue-books,  and  the 
pen  slipped  from  my  hand,  in  the  midst  of  an  extract  from 
a  Report  on  Sierra  Leone.  My  pulse  beat  loud  and  quick ;  I 
was  in  that  state  of  nervous  fever  which  only  emotion  can 
occasion.  The  sweet  voice  of  Fanny  rang  in  my  ears ;  her 
eyes,  as  I  had  last  seen  them,  unusually  gentle — almost  be- 
seeching— gazed  upon  me  wherever  I  turned:  and  then,  as  in 
mockery,  I  heard  again  those  words, — "  One  ought  to  be  an 
earl,  at  least,  to  aspire  to" — Oh !  did  I  aspire  ?  Was  I  vain 
fool  so  frantic  ? — household  traitor  so  consummate  ?  No,  no ! 
Then  what  did  I  under  the  same  roof? — why  stay  to  imbibe 
this  sweet  poison,  that  was  corroding  the  very  springs  of  my 
life  ?  At  that  self-question,  which,  had  I  been  but  a  year  or 
two  older,  I  should  have  asked  long  before,  a  mortal  terror 
seized  me ;  the  blood  rushed  from  my  heart,  and  left  me  cold 
— icy  cold.  To  leave  the  house — leave  Fanny ! — never  again 
to  see  those  eyes — never  to  hear  that  voice !  better  die  of  the 
sweet  poison  than  of  the  desolate  exile !  I  rose — I  opened  the 
windows — I  walked  to  and  fro  the  room :  I  could  decide  noth- 
ing— think  of  nothing ;  all  my  mind  was  in  an  uproar.  With 
a  violent  effort  at  self-mastery,  I  approached  the  table  again. 


212  i  m:   CAXT0K6  : 

1  resolved  to  force  myself  to  my  task,  if  it  wore  only  to  re-col- 
lecl  my  faculties,  and  enable  them  to  bear  my  own  torture.  I 
turned  over  the  books  impatiently,  when,  lo!  buried  amongst 
them,  what  met  my  eye? — archly,  yet  reproachfully — the  face 
of  Fanny  herself!  Her  miniature  was  there.  It  had  been,  I 
knew,  taken  a  few  days  before  by  a  young  artist  whom  Tre- 
vanion  patronized.  I  suppose  he  had  carried  it  into  his  Btudy 
to  examine  it,  and  so  left  it  there  carelessly.  The  painter  had 
seized  her  peculiar  expression,  her  ineffable  smile — so  charm- 
ing, so  malicious  ;  even  her  favourite  posture — the  small  head 
turned  over  the  rounded  Hebe-like  shoulder — the  eye  glancing 
up  from  under  the  hair.  I  know  not  what  change  in  my  mad- 
ness came  over  me ;  but  I  sank  on  my  knees,  and,  kissing  the 
miniature  again  and  again,  burst  into  tears.  Such  tears !  I 
did  not  hear  the  door  open — I  did  not  see  the  shadow  steal 
over  the  floor :  a  light  hand  rested  on  my  shoulder,  trembling 
as  it  rested — I  started.     Fanny  herself  was  bending  over  me ! 

"  What  is  the  matter  ?"  she  asked,  tenderly.  "  What  has 
happened?  —  your  uncle — your  family — all  well?  Why  are 
you  weeping?" 

I  could  not  answer  ;  but  I  kept  my  hands  clasped  over  the 
miniature,  that  she  might  not  see  what  they  contained. 

u  Will  you  not  answer  ?  Am  I  not  your  friend  ? — almost 
your  sister  ?     Come,  shall  I  call  mamma  ?" 

"  Yes — yes  ;  go — go." 

"Xo,  I  will  not  go  yet.  What  have  you  there? — what  are 
you  hiding  ?" 

And  innocently,  and  sister-like,  those  hands  took  mine ;  and 
so — and  so — the  picture  became  visible  !  There  was  a  dead 
silence.  I  looked  up  through  my  tears.  Fanny  had  recoiled 
some  steps,  and  her  cheek  was  very  flushed,  her  eyes  downcast. 
I  felt  as  if  I  had  committed  a  crime — as  if  dishonour  clung  to 
me  ;  and  yet  1  repressed — yes,  thank  Heaven !  I  repressed  the 
civ  that  swelled  from  my  heart,  and  rushed  to  my  lips — "Pity 
me,  for  I  love  you  !"  I  repressed  it,  and  only  a  groan  escaped 
me — the  wail  of  my  lost  happiness  !  Then,  rising,  I  laid  the 
miniature  on  the  table,  and  said,  in  a  voice  that  I  believe  was 
firm — 

"  .Miss  Trcvanion,  you  have  been  as  kind  as  a  sister  to  me, 
and  therefore  I  Avas  bidding  a  brother's  farewell  to  your  like- 
ness ;  it  is  bo  like  you — this!1' 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  213 

"  Farewell !"  echoed  Fanny,  still  not  looking  up. 

"  Farewell — sister  !  There,  I  have  boldly  said  the  word  ; 
for — for" — I  hurried  to  the  door,  and,  there  turning,  added, 
with  what  I  meant  to  be  a  smile — "  for  they  say  at  home  that 
I — I  am  not  well ;  too  much  for  me  this  ;  you  know,  mothers 
will  be  foolish ;  and — and — I  am  to  speak  to  your  father  to- 
morrow ;  and — good  night — God  bless  you,  Miss  Trevanion !" 


PAET  NINTH. 

CHAPTER  I. 

Axd  my  father  pushed  aside  his  books. 

O  young  reader,  whoever  thou  art, — or  reader,  at  least,  who 
hast  been  young, — canst  thou  not  remember  some  time  when, 
with  thy  wild  troubles  and  sorrows  as  yet  borne  in  secret,  thou 
hast  come  back  from  that  hard,  stern  world  which  opens  on 
thee  when  thou  puttest  thy  foot  out  of  the  threshold  of  home 
— come  back  to  the  four  quiet  walls,  wherein  thine  elders  sit  in 
peace — and  seen,  with  a  sort  of  sad  amaze,  how  calm  and  un- 
disturbed all  is  there  ?  That  generation  which  has  gone  be- 
fore thee  in  the  path  of  the  passions — the  generation  of  thy 
parents  (not  so  many  years,  perchance,  remote  from  thine  own) 
— how  immovably  far  off,  hi  its  still  repose,  it  seems  from  thy 
turbulent  youth  !  It  has  in  it  a  stillness  as  of  a  classic  age,  an- 
tique as  the  statues  of  the  Greeks.  That  tranquil  monotony 
of  routine  into  which  those  lives  that  preceded  thee  have 
merged — the  occupations  that  they  have  found  sufficing  for 
their  happiness,  by  the  fireside — in  the  arm-chair  and  corner 
appropriated  to  each — how  strangely  they  contrast  thine  own 
feverish  excitement !  And  they  make  room  for  thee,  and  bid 
thee  welcome,  and  then  resettle  to  their  hushed  pursuits,  as  if 
nothing  had  happened !  Nothing  had  happened  !  while  in  thy 
heart,  perhaps,  the  whole  world  seems  to  have  shot  from  its 
axis,  all  the  elements  to  be  at  war  !  And  you  sit  down,  crush- 
ed by  that  quiet  happiness  which  you  can  share  no  more,  and 
smile  mechanically,  and  look  into  the  fire  ;  and,  ten  to  one,  you 
say  nothing  till  the  time  comes  for  bed,  and  you  take  up  your 
candle,  and  creep  miserably  to  your  lonely  room. 

Now,  if  in  a  stage-coach  in  the  depth  of  winter,  when  three 
passengers  are  warm  and  snug,  a  fourth,  all  besnowed  and 
frozen,  descends  from  the  outside  and  takes  place  amongst 
them,  Btraightway  all  the  three  passengers  shift  their  places, 
uneasily  pull  up  their  cloak  collars,  re-arrange  their  "  comfort- 
ers," feel  indignantly  a  sensible  loss  of  caloric — the  intruder 


THE   CAXTONS.  215 

has  at  least  made  a  sensation.  But  if  you  had  all  the  snows 
of  the  Grampians  in  your  heart,  you  might  enter  unnoticed ; 
take  care  not  to  tread  on  the  toes  of  your  opposite  neighbour, 
and  not  a  soul  is  disturbed,  not  a  "  comforter"  stirs  an  inch  ! 
I  had  not  slept  a  wink,  I  had  not  even  laid  down  all  that  night 
— the  night  in  which  I  had  said  farewell  to  Fanny  Trevanion— 
and  the  next  morning,  when  the  sun  rose,  I  wandered  out — 
where,  I  know  not.  I  have  a  dim  recollection  of  long,  gray, 
solitary  streets — of  the  river  that  seemed  flowing  in  dull  sullen 
silence,  away,  far  away,  into  some  invisible  eternity — trees  and 
turf,  and  the  gay  voices  of  children.  I  must  have  gone  from 
one  end  of  the  great  Babel  to  the  other  :  but  my  memory  only 
became  clear  and  distinct  when  I  knocked,  somewhere  before 
noon,  at  the  door  of  my  father's  house,  and,  passing  heavily  up 
the  stairs,  came  into  the  drawing-room,  which  was  the  rendez- 
vous of  the  little  family ;  for,  since  we  had  been  in  London,  my 
father  had  ceased  to  have  his  study  apart,  and  contented  him- 
self with  what  he  called  "a  corner" — a  corner  wide  enough  to 
contain  two  tables  and  a  dumb  waiter,  with  chairs  a  discretion 
all  littered  with  books.  On  the  opposite  side  of  this  capacious 
corner  sat  my  uncle,  now  nearly  convalescent,  and  he  was  jot- 
ting down,  in  his  stiff  military  hand,  certain  figures  in  a  little 
red  account-book — for  you  know  already  that  my  uncle  Ro- 
land was,  in  his  expenses,  the  most  methodical  of  men. 

My  father's  face  was  more  benign  than  usual,  for  before  him 
lay  a  proof — the  first  proof  of  his  first  work — his  one  work — 
the  Great  Book !  Yes !  it  had  positively  found  a  press.  And 
the  first  proof  of  your  first  work — ask  any  author  what  that 
is!  My  mother  was  out  with  the  faithful  Mrs.  Primmins, 
shopping  or  marketing,  no  doubt ;  so,  while  the  brothers  were 
thus  engaged,  it  was  natural  that  my  entrance  should  not  make 
as  much  noise  as  if  it  had  been  a  bomb,  or  a  singer,  or  a  clap 
of  thunder,  or  the  last  "  great  novel  of  the  season,"  or  anything 
else  that  made  a  noise  in  those  days.  For  what  makes  a  noise 
now  ?  Now,  when  the  most  astonishing  thing  of  all  is  our 
easy  familiarity  with  things  astounding — when  we  say,  listless- 
ly, "  Another  revolution  at  Paris,"  or,  "  By-the-by,  there  is  the 
deuce  to  do  at  Vienna !" — when  De  Joinville  is  catching  fish  in 
the  ponds  at  Claremont,  and  you  hardly  turn  back  to  look  at 
Metternich  on  the  pier  at  Brighton ! 

My  uncle  nodded  and  growled  indistinctly ;  my  father — 


216  THE  <  axtoxs: 

"  Put  aside  his  books;  you  have  told  us  that  already." 
Sir.  yen  are  very  much  mistaken;  it  was  not  then  that  he 
put  aside  his  books,  for  lie  was  not  then  engaged  in  them — he 
was  reading  his  proof.  And  he  smiled,  and  pointed  to  it  (the 
proof  I  mean)  pathetically,  and  with  a  kind  of  humour,  as 
much  as  to  say — "  what  can  you  expect,  Pisistratus? — my  new 
baby  in  short  clothes — or  long  primer,  which  is  all  the  same 
thing !" 

I  took  a  chair  between  the  two,  and  looked  first  at  one,  then 
at  the  other — heaven  forgive  me ! — I  felt  a  rebellious  ungrate- 
ful spite  against  both.  The  bitterness  of  my  soul  must  have 
been  deep  indeed,  to  have  overflowed  in  that  direction,  but  it 
did.  The  grief  of  youth  is  an  abominable  egotist,  and  that  is 
the  truth.  I  got  up  from  the  chair,  and  walked  towards  the 
window ;  it  was  open,  and  outside  the  window  was  Mrs.  Prim- 
mins'  canary,  in  its  cage.  London  air  had  agreed  with  it,  and 
it  was  singing  lustily.  Now,  when  the  canary  saw  me  stand- 
ing opposite  to  its  cage,  and  regarding  it  seriously,  and,  I  have 
no  doubt,  with  a  very  sombre  aspect,  the  creature  stopped 
short,  and  hung  his  head  on  one  side,  looking  at  me  obliquely 
and  suspiciously.  Finding  that  I  did  it  no  harm,  it  began  to 
hazard  a  few  broken  notes,  timidly  and  interrogatively,  as  it 
were,  pausing  between  each  ;  and  at  length,  as  I  made  no  re- 
ply, it  evidently  thought  it  had  solved  the  doubt,  and  ascer- 
tained that  I  was  more  to  be  pitied  than  feared — for  it  stole 
gradually  into  so  soft  and  silvery  a  strain  that,  I  verily  believe, 
it  did  it  on  purpose  to  comfort  me ! — me,  its  old  friend,  whom 
it  had  unjustly  suspected.  Never  did  any  music  touch  me  so 
home  as  did  that  long  plaintive  cadence.  And  when  the  bird 
ceased,  it  perched  itself  close  to  the  bars  of  the  cage,  and  look- 
ed at  me  steadily  with  its  bright  intelligent  eyes.  I  felt  mine 
water,  and  I  turned  back  and  stood  in  the  centre  of  the  room, 
irresolute  what  to  do,  where  to  go.  My  father  had  done  with 
the  proof,  and  was  deep  in  his  folios.  Roland  had  clasped  his 
red  account-book,  restored  it  to  his  pocket,  wiped  his  pen  care- 
fully, and  now  watched  me  from  under  his  great  beetle-brows. 
Suddenly  he  rose,  and,  stamping  on  the  hearth  with  his  cork- 
leg,  exclaimed,  "Look  up  from  those  cursed  books,  brother 
Austin!  What  is  there  in  your  son's  face  ?  Construe  that,  if 
you  can !" 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  21 7 


CHAPTER  II. 

And  my  father  pushed  aside  his  books,  and  rose  hastily. 
He  took  off  his  spectacles,  and  nibbed  them  mechanically,  but 
he  said  nothing ;  and  my  uncle,  staring  at  him  for  a  moment, 
in  surprise  at  his  silence,  burst  out — 

"  Oh !  I  see ;  he  has  been  getting  into  some  scrape,  and  you 
are  angry.  Fie !  young  blood  will  have  its  way,  Austin,  it  will. 
I  don't  blame  that — it  is  only  when — come  here,  Sisty.  Zounds ! 
man,  come  here." 

My  father  gently  brushed  off  the  Captain's  hand,  and,  ad- 
vancing towards  me,  opened  his  arms.  The  next  moment  I 
was  sobbing  on  his  breast. 

"  But  what  is  the  matter  ?"  cried  Captain  Roland — "  will  no- 
body say  what  is  the  matter  ?  Money,  I  suppose — money,  you 
confounded  extravagant  young  dog.  Luckily  you  have  got  an 
uncle  who  has  more  than  he  knows  what  to  do  with.  How 
much?  Fifty? — a  hundred? — two  hundred?  How  can  I 
write  the  cheque,  if  you'll  not  speak  ?" 

"  Hush,  brother !  it  is  no  money  you  can  give  that  will  set 
this  right.  My  poor  boy!  Have  I  guessed  truly?  Did  I 
guess  truly  the  other  evening,  when — " 

"  Yes,  sir,  yes  !  I  have  been  so  wretched.  But  I  am  better 
now — I  can  tell  you  all." 

My  uncle  moved  slowly  towards  the  door :  his  fine  sense  of 
delicacy  made  him  think  that  even  he  was  out  of  place  in  the 
confidence  between  son  and  father. 

"  Xo,  uncle,"  I  said,  holding  out  my  hand  to  hini,  "  stay;  you 
too  can  advise  me — strengthen  me.  I  have  kept  my  honour 
yet — help  me  to  keep  it  still." 

At  the  sound  of  the  word  honour,  Captain  Roland  stood 
mute,  and  raised  his  head  quickly. 

So  I  told  all — incoherently  enough  at  first,  but  clearly  and 
manfully  as  I  went  on.  Xow  I  know  that  it  is  not  the  custom 
of  lovers  to  confide  in  fathers  and  imcles.  Judging  by  those 
mirrors  of  life,  plays  and  novels, they  choose  better; — valets 
and  chambermaids,  and  friends  whom  they  have  picked  up  in  the 

K 


2  1  8  THE   CAXTONS  '. 

street,  as  I  had  picked  up  poor  Francis  Vivian — to  these  they 
make  clean  breasts  oi  their  troubles.  But  fathers  and  uncles 
— to  them  they  are  close,  impregnable,  "buttoned  to  the  chin." 
The  Caxtons  were  an  eccentric  family,  and  never  *  1 1  <  I  anything 
like  otherpeople.  When  I  had  ended,  I  lifted,  up  my  eyes,  and 
Baid,  pleadingly, kw  Now,  tell  me,  is  there  no  hope — none?" 

"Why  should  there  be  none?"  cried  Captain  Roland, hasti- 
ly— "The  De  Caxtons  are  as  good  a  family  as  the Trevanions  ; 
and  as  for  yourself,  all  I  will  say  is,  that  the  young  lady  might 
choose  worse  for  her  own  happiness." 

I  wrung  my  uncle's  hand,  and  turned  to  my  father  in  anxious 
fear,  for  I  knew  that,  in  spite  of  his  secluded  habits,  few  men 
ever  formed  a  sounder  judgment  on  worldly  matters,  when  he 
was  fairly  drawn  to  look  at  them.  A  thing  wonderful  is  that 
plain  wisdom  which  scholars  and  poets  often  have  for  others, 
though  they  rarely  deign  to  use  it  for  themselves.  And  how 
on  earth  do' they  get  at  it?  I  looked  at  my  father,  and  the 
vague  hope  Roland  had  excited  fell  as  I  looked. 

"Brother,"  said  he,  slowly,  and  shaking  his  head,  "the  world, 
which  gives  codes  and  laws  to  those  who  live  in  it,  does  not 
care  much  for  a  pedigree,  unless  it  goes  with  a  title-deed  to 
eMates/' 

"  Trevanion  was  not  richer  than  Pisistratus  when  he  mar- 
ried Lady  Ellinor,"  said  my  uncle. 

*"  True ;  but  Lady  Ellinor  was  not  then  an  heiress  ;  and  her 
father  viewed  these  matters  as  no  other  peer  in  England  per- 
haps would.  As  for  Trevanion  himself,  I  dare  say  he  has  no 
prejudices  about  station,  but  he  is  strong  hi  common  sense. 
He  values  himself  on  being  a  practical  man.  It  would  be  folly 
to  talk  to  him  of  love,  and  the  affections  of  youth.  He  would 
see  in  the  son  of  Austin  Caxton,  living  on  the  interest  of  some 
fifteen  or  sixteen  thousand  pounds,  such  a  match  for  his  daugh- 
ter as  no  prudent  man  in  his  position  could  approve.  And  as 
for  Lady  Ellinor" — 

'•She  owes  us  much,  Austin !"  exclaimed  Roland,  his  nice 
darkening. 

"Lady  Ellinor  is  now  what,  if  we  had  known  her  better,  she 
promised  always  to  be  —  the  ambitious,  brilliant,  scheming 
woman  of  the  world.     Is  it  not  s«>, — Pisistratus?" 

I  said  nothing — I  felt  too  much. 

"And  does  the  girl  like  you? — but  I  think  it  is  clear  she 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  219 

does  !"  exclaimed  Roland.  "  Fate,  fate  ;  it  has  been  a  fatal 
family  to  ns  !  Zonnds  !  Austin,  it  was  your  fault.  Why  did 
you  let  him  go  there  ?" 

"  My  son  is  now  a  man — at  least  in  heart,  if  not  in  years — 
can  man  be  shut  from  danger  and  trial  ?  They  found  me  in 
the  old  parsonage,  brother !"  said  my  father,  mildly. 

My  uncle  walked,  or  rather  stumped,  three  times  up  and 
down  the  room ;  and  he  then  stopped  short,  folded  his  arms, 
and  came  to  a  decision — 

"  If  the  girl  likes  you,  your  duty  is  doubly  clear — you  can't 
take  advantage  of  it.  You  have  done  right  to  leave  the  house, 
for  the  temptation  might  be  too  strong." 

"  But  what  excuse  shall  I  make  to  Mr.  Trevanion  ?"  said  I, 
feebly — "  what  story  can  I  invent  ?  So  careless  as  he  is  while 
he  trusts,  so  penetrating  if  he  once  suspects,  he  will  see  through 
all  my  subterfuges,  and — and — " 

"  It  is  as  plain  as  a  pike-staff,"  said  my  uncle,  abruptly — "  and 
there  need  be  no  subterfuge  hi  the  matter.  l  I  must  leave  you, 
Mr. Trevanion.'  'Why,'  says  he.  'Don't  ask  me.'  He  in- 
sists. '  Well  then,  sir,  if  you  must  know,  I  love  your  daughter. 
I  have  nothing,  she  is  a  great  heiress.  You  will  not  approve 
of  that  love,  and  therefore  I  leave  you !'  That  is  the  course 
that  becomes  an  English  gentleman.     Eh,  Austin  ?" 

"  You  are  never  wrong  when  your  instincts  speak,  Roland," 
said  my  father.  "  Can  you  say  this,  Pisistratus,  or  shall  I  say 
it  for  you  ?" 

"  Let  him  say  it  himself,"  said  Roland ;  "  and  let  him  judge 
himself  of  the  answer.  He  is  young,  he  is  clever,  he  may  make 
a  figure  in  the  world.  Trevanion  may  answer, '  Win  the  lady 
after  you  have  won  the  laurel,  like  the  knights  of  old.'  At  all 
events  you  will  hear  the  worst." 

"  I  will  go,"  said  I,  firmly ;  and  I  took  my  hat  and  left  the 
room.  As  I  was  passing  the  landing-place,  a  light  step  stole 
down  the  upper  flight  of  stairs,  and  a  little  hand  seized  my 
own.  I  turned  quickly,  and  met  the  full,  dark,  seriously  sweet 
eyes  of  my  cousin  Blanche. 

"  Don't  go  away  yet,  Sisty,"  said  she  coaxingly.  "  I  have 
been  waiting  for  you,  for  I  heard  your  voice,  and  did  not  like 
to  come  in  and  disturb  you." 

"  And  why  did  you  wait  for  me,  my  little  Blanche  ?" 

"  Why !  only  to  see  you.    But  your  eyes  are  red.    Oh,  cous- 


•J 20  THE   caxtoxs  : 

iii!"  and,  before  T  was  aware  of  her  childish  impulse,  she  had 
sprung  i"  my  Deck  and  kissed  me.  Now  Blanche  was  not  like 
aosl  children,  and  was  very  sparing  of  her  caresses.  So  it  was 
out  of  thedeepsof  a  kindheart  thai  that  kiss  came.  I  return- 
ed it  without  a  word;  and,  putting  her  down  gently,  descend- 
ed the  stairs,  and  was  in  the  streets.  But  I  had  not  got  far 
before  I  heard  my  father's  voice;  and  he  came  up,  and  hook- 
ing his  arm  into  mine,  said,  "Are  there  not  two  of  us  that  suf- 
fer?— let  us  be  together!"  I  pressed  his  arm,  and  Ave  walked 
on  in  silence.  But  when  we  were  near  Trevanion's  house,  I 
said,  hesitatingly,  tw  Would  it  not  be  better,  sir,  that  I  went  in 
alone  ?  If  there  is  to  be  an  explanation  between  Mr.  Trevanion 
and  myself,  would  it  not  seem  as  if  your  presence  implied  ei- 
ther a  request  to  him  that  would  lower  us  both,  or  a  doubt  of 
me  that — " 

"  You  will  go  in  alone,  of  course :  I  will  Avait  for  you — " 

"  Xot  in  the  streets — oh,  no  !  my  father,"  cried  I,  touched 
inexpressibly.  For  all  this  w^as  so  unlike  my  father's  habits, 
that  I  felt  remorse  to  have  so  communicated  my  young  griefs 
to  the  calm  dignity  of  his  serene  life. 

"My  son,  you  do  not  know  how  I  love  you.  I  have  only 
known  it  myself  lately.  Look  you,  I  am  living  in  you  now,  my 
first-born  ;  not  in  my  other  son — the  Great  Book  :  I  must  have 
my  way.     Go  in  ;  that  is  the  door,  is  it  not?" 

I  pressed  my  father's  hand,  and  I  felt  then,  that  while  that 
hand  could  reply  to  mine,  even  the  loss  of  Fanny  Trevanion 
could  not  leave  the  world  a  blank.  How  much  Ave  have  be- 
fore us  in  life,  Avhile  Ave  retain  our  parents !  Hoav  much  to 
striATe  and  to  hope  for!  What  a  motive  in  the  conquest  of  our 
sorroAv — that  they  may  not  sorrow  Avith  us ! 


CHAPTER  III. 

I  exteeed  Trevanion's  study.  It  Avas  an  hour  in  which  lie 
Avas  rarely  at  home,  but  I  had  not  thought  of  that;  and  I  saw 
without  surprise  that,  contrary  to  his  custom,  he  Avas  in  his 
.  rni-cliair,  reading  one  of  his  favourite  classic  authors,  instead 
of  being  in  some  committee-room  of  the  House  of  Commons. 

"A  pretty  fellow  you  are,"  said  lie,  looking  up,  "to  leave 
me  all  the  morning,  without  rhyme  or  reason!     And  my  com- 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  221 

mittee  is  postponed — chairman  ill ;  people  who  get  ill  should 
not  go  into  the  House  of  Commons.  So  here  I  am,  looking 
into  Propertius :  Parr  is  right ;  not  so  elegant  a  writer  as  Ti- 
bullus.  But  what  the  deuce  are  you  about  ? — why  don't  you 
sit  down  ?  Humph  !  you  look  grave — you  have  something  to 
say — say  it !" 

And,  putting  down  Propertius,  the  acute  sharp  face  of  Tre- 
vanion  instantly  became  earnest  and  attentive. 

"  My  dear  Mr.  Trevanion,"  said  I,  with  as  much  steadiness 
as  I  could  assume,  "  you  have  been  most  kind  to  me ;  and  out 
of  my  own  family  there  is  no  man  I  love  and  respect  more." 

Teevaxiox. — "  Humph  !  What's  all  this  ?  (In  an  under 
tone) — Am  I  going  to  be  taken  in  ?" 

Pisisteatus. — "  Do  not  think  me  ungrateful,  then,  when  I 
say  I  come  to  resign  my  office — to  leave  the  house  where  I 
have  been  so  happy." 

Teevaxiox. — "  Leave  the  house !  Pooh !  I  have  overtask- 
ed you.  I  will  be  more  merciful  in  future.  You  must  forgive 
a  political  economist ;  it  is  the  fault  of  my  sect  to  look  upon 
men  as  machines." 

Pisisteatus  (smiling  faintly). — "  Xo,  indeed  ;  that  is  not  it ! 
I  have  nothing  to  complain  of;  nothing  I  could  wish  altered 
— could  I  stay." 

Teevaxiox  (examining  me  thoughtfully). — "And  does  your 
father  approve  of  your  leaving  me  thus  ?" 

Pisisteatus. — "  Yes — fully." 

Teevaxiox  (musing  a  moment). — "  I  see,  he  would  send  you 
to  the  University,  make  you  a  book-worm  like  himself:  pooh ! 
that  will  not  do — you  will  never  become  wholly  a  man  of  books 
— it  is  not  in  you.  Young  man,  though  I  may  seem  careless, 
I  read  characters,  when  I  please  it,  pretty  quickly.  You  do 
wrong  to  leave  me ;  you  are  made  for  the  great  world — I  can 
open  to  you  a  high  career.  I  wish  to  do  so!  Lady  Ellinor 
wishes  it — nay,  insists  on  it — for  your  father's  sake  as  well  as 
yours.  I  never  ask  a  favour  from  ministers,  and  I  never  will. 
But  (here  Trevanion  rose  suddenly,  and,  with  an  erect  mien 
and  a  quick  gesture  of  his  arm,  he  added,) — but  a  minister  can 
dispose  as  he  pleases  of  his  patronage.  Look  you,  it  is  a  secret 
yet,  and  I  trust  to  your  honour.  But,  before  the  year  is  out,  I 
must  be  in  the  cabinet.  Stay  with  me,  I  guarantee  your  for- 
tunes— three  months  ago  I  would  not  have  said  that.    By-and- 


222  ru r:  <  axtons: 

by  I  will  open  Parliament  for  you — you  are  not  of  age  yet — 
work  till  then.  And  now  sit  down  and  write  my  letters — a 
Bad  anvarr 

"  My  dear,  dear  Mr.  Trevanion !"  said  I,  so  affected  that  I 
could  scarcely  speak,  and  seizing  his  hand,  which  I  pressed  be- 
tween  both  mine  —  "I  dare  not  thank  you — I  cannot!  But 
you  don't  know  my  heart — it  is  not  ambition.  No !  if  I  could 
but  stay  here  on  the  same  terms  for  ever — //ere" — looking  rue- 
fully on  that  spot  where  Fanny  had  stood  the  night  before. 
"But  it  is  impossible  ! — if  you  knew  all,  you  would  be  the  first 
to  bid  me  go  I" 

"  You  are  in  debt,"  said  the  man  of  the  world,  coldly.  "  Bad, 
very  bad — still — " 

"  No,  sir ;  no  !  worse — " 

"  Hardly  possible  to  be  worse,  young  man — hardly !  But, 
just  as  you  will ;  you  leave  me,  and  will  not  say  why.  Good- 
by.     Why  do  you  linger  ?     Shake  hands,  and  go  !" 

"  I  cannot  leave  you  thus :  I — I — sir,  the  truth  shall  out.  I 
am  rash  and  mad  enough  not  to  see  Miss  Trevanion  without 
forgetting  that  I  am  poor,  and — " 

"  Ha !"  interrupted  Trevanion,  softly,  and  growing  pale,  "this 
is  a  misfortune,  indeed !  And  I,  who  talked  of  reading  char- 
acters !  Truly,  truly,  we  would-be  practical  men  are  fools — 
fools !     And  you  have  made  love  to  my  daughter  !" 

"  Sir  ?  Mr.  Trevanion  ! — no — never,  never  so  base  !  In  your 
house,  trusted  by  you,  —  how  could  you  think  it?  I  dared,  it 
may  be,  to  love — at  all  events,  to  feel  that  I  could  not  be  in- 
sensible to  a  temptation  too  strong  for  me.  But  to  say  it  to 
your  heiress — to  ask  love  in  return — I  would  as  soon  have 
broken  open  your  desk !  Frankly  I  tell  you  my  folly :  it  is  a 
folly,  not  a  disgrace." 

Trevanion  came  up  to  me  abruptly,  as  I  leant  against  the 
bookcase,  and,  grasping  my  band  with  a  cordial  kindness,  said, 
"  Pardon  me !  You  have  behaved  as  your  father's  son  should 
— I  envy  him  such  a  son !  Now,  listen  to  me — I  cannot  give 
yon  my  daughter — " 

"  Believe  me,  sir,  I  never — " 

"Tut,  listen  !  I  cannot  give  you  my  daughter.  I  say  noth- 
ing of  inequality — all  gentlemen  are  equal;  and  if  not,  any  im- 
pertinenl  affectation  of  superiority,  in  such  a  case,  would  come 
ill  from  one  who  owes  his  own  fortune  to  his  wile!     But,  as  it 


A    FAMILY    PICTUEE.  223 

is,  I  have  a  stake  in  the  world,  won  not  by  fortune  only,  but 
the  labour  of  a  life,  the  suppression  of  half  ray  nature — the 
drudging,  squaring,  taming  down  all  that  made  the  glory  and 
joy  of  my  youth — to  be  that  hard  matter-of-fact  thing  which 
the  English  world  expect  in  a  statesman!  This  station  has 
gradually  opened  into  its  natural  result — power !  I  tell  you  I 
shall  soon  have  high  office  in  the  administration:  I  hope  to 
render  great  services  to  England — for  we  English  politicians, 
whatever  the  mob  and  the  press  say  of  us,  are  not  selfish  place- 
hunters.  I  refused  office,  as  high  as  I  look  for  now,  ten  years 
ago.  We  believe  in  our  opinions,  and  we  hail  the  power  that 
may  carry  them  into  effect.  In  this  cabinet  I  shall  have  en- 
emies. Oh,  don't  think  Ave  leave  jealousy  behind  us,  at  the 
doors  of  Downing  Street !  I  shall  be  one  of  a  minority.  I 
know  well  what  must  happen :  like  all  men  in  power,  I  must 
strengthen  myself  by  other  heads  and  hands  than  my  own. 
My  daughter  shall  bring  to  me  the  alliance  of  that  house  in 
England  which  is  most  necessary  to  me.  My  life  falls  to  the 
ground,  like  a  child's  pyramid  of  cards,  if  I  waste — I  do  not 
say  on  you,  but  on  men  of  ten  times  your  fortune  (whatever 
that  be),  the  means  of  strength  which  are  at  my  disposal  in 
the  hand  of  Fanny  Trevanion.  To  this  end  I  have  looked ; 
but  to  this  end  her  mother  has  schemed — for  these  household 
matters  are  within  a  man's  hopes,  but  belong  to  a  woman's 
policy.  So  much  for  us.  But  to  you,  my  dear,  and  frank,  and 
high-souled  young  friend — to  you,  if  I  were  not  Fanny's  father 
— if  I  were  your  nearest  relation,  and  Fanny  could  be  had  for 
the  asking,  with  all  her  princely  dower  (for  it  is  princely), — to 
you  I  should  say,  fly  from  a  load  upon  the  heart,  on  the  genius, 
the  energy,  the  pride,  and  the  spirit,  which  not  one  man  in  ten 
thousand  can  bear ;  fly  from  the  curse  of  owing  everything  to 
a  wife ! — it  is  a  reversal  of  all  natural  position ;  it  is  a  blow  to 
all  the  manhood  within  us.  You  know  not  what  it  is ;  I  do ! 
My  wife's  fortune  came  not  till  after  marriage — so  far,  so  well ; 
it  saved  my  reputation  from  the  charge  of  fortune-hunting. 
But,  I  tell  you  fairly,  that  if  it  had  never  come  at  all,  I  should 
be  a  prouder,  and  a  greater,  and  a  happier  man  than  I  have 
ever  been,  or  ever  can  be,  with  all  its  advantages ;  it  has  been 
a  millstone  round  my  neck.  And  yet  Ellinor  has  never  breathed 
a  word  that  could  wound  my  pride.  Would  her  daughter  be 
as  forbearing  ?     Much  as  I  love  Fanny,  I  doubt  if  she  has  the 


224  THE    I    LXTONS: 

great  heaii  of  her  mother.  You  look  incredulous; — naturally. 
Oh,  y<»u  think  I  Bhall  sacrifice  my  child's  happiness  to  a  politi- 
cian's ambition.  Folly  of  yxmth !  Fanny  would  be  wretched 
with  you.  She  might  not  think  so  now;  she  wouldfive  years 
hence  !  Fanny  -will  make  an  admirable  duchess,  countess,  great 
lady  ;  but  wife  to  a  man  who  owes  all  to  her! — no,  no,  don't 
dicam  it !  I  shall  not  sacrifice  her  happiness,  depend  on  it.  I 
Bpeak  plainly,  as  man  to  man — man  of  the  world  to  a  man  just 
entering  it — hut  still  man  to  man  !     What  say  you  ?" 

k*  I  will  think  over  all  you  tell  me.  I  know  that  you  are 
speaking  to  me  most  generously — as  a  father  would.  Now  let 
me  go,  and  may  God  keep  you  and  yours!" 

"  Go — I  return  your  blessing — go !  I  don't  insult  you  now 
with  offers  of  service;  but,  remember,  you  have  a  right  to 
command  them — in  all  ways,  in  all  times.  Stop  ! — take  this 
comfort  away  with  you — a  sorry  comfort  now,  a  great  one 
hereafter.  In  a  position  that  might  have  moved  anger,  scorn, 
pity,  you  have  made  a  barren-hearted  man  honour  and  admire 
you.  You,  a  boy,  have  made  me,  with  my  gray  hairs,  think 
better  of  the  whole  world ;  tell  your  father  that." 

I  closed  the  door,  and  stole  out  softly — softly.  But  when  I 
got  into  the  hall,  Fanny  suddenly  opened  the  door  of  the 
breakfast  parlour,  and  seemed,  by  her  look,  her  gesture,  to  in- 
vite me  in.  Her  face  was  very  pale,  and  there  were  traces  of 
tears  on  the  heavy  lids. 

I  stood  still  a  moment,  and  my  heart  beat  violently.  I  then 
muttered  something  inarticulately,  and,  bowing  low,  hastened 
to  the  door. 

I  thought,  but  my  ears  might  deceive  me,  that  I  had  heard 
my  name  pronounced ;  but  fortunately  the  tall  porter  started 
from  his  newspaper  and  his  leathern  chair,  and  the  entrance 
stood  open.     I  joined  my  father. 

"It  is  all  over,"  said  I,  with  a  resolute  smile.  "And  now, 
my  dear  father,  I  feel  how  grateful  I  should  be  for  all  that  your 
lessons — your  life — have  taught  me ;  for,  believe  me,  I  am  not 
unhappy." 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  225 


CHAPTER  IV. 


"We  came  back  to  my  father's  house,  and  on  the  stairs  we 
met  my  mother,  whom  Roland's  grave  looks,  and  her  Austin's 
strange  absence,  had  alarmed.  My  father  quietly  led  the  way 
to  a  little  room,  which  my  mother  had  appropriated  to  Blanche 
and  herself:  and  then,  placing  my  hand  in  that  which  had 
helped  his  own  steps  from  the  stony  path  down  the  quiet  vales 
of  life,  he  said  to  me, — "  Nature  gives  you  here  the  soother ;" 
and  so  saying,  he  left  the  room. 

And  it  was  true,  O  my  mother !  that  in  thy  simple  loving 
breast  nature  did  place  the  deep  wells  of  comfort !  We  come 
to  men  for  philosophy — to  women  for  consolation.  And  the 
thousand  weaknesses  and  regrets — the  sharp  sands  of  the  mi- 
nutiae that  make  up  sorrow — all  these,  which  I  could  have  be- 
trayed to  no  man — not  even  to  him,  the  dearest  and  tenderest 
of  all  men  —  I  showed  without  shame  to  thee!  And  thy 
tears,  that  fell  on  my  cheek,  had  the  balm  of  Araby ;  and  my 
heart,  at  length,  lay  lulled  and  soothed  under  thy  moist  gentle 
eyes. 

I  made  an  effort,  and  joined  the  little  circle  at  dinner ;  and 
I  felt  grateful  that  no  violent  attempt  was  made  to  raise  my 
spirits — nothing  but  affection,  more  subdued,  and  soft,  and 
tranquil.  Even  little  Blanche,  as  if  by  the  intuition  of  sym- 
pathy, ceased  her  babble,  and  seemed  to  hush  her  footstep  as 
she  crept  to  my  side.  But  after  dinner,  when  we  had  reassem- 
bled in  the  drawing-room,  and  the  lights  shone  bright,  and  the 
curtains  were  let  down — and  only  the  quick  roll  of  some  pass- 
ing wheels  reminded  us  that  there  was  a  world  without — my 
father  began  to  talk.  He  had  laid  aside  all  his  work;  the 
younger  but  less  perishable  child  was  forgotten, — and  my  fa- 
ther began  to  talk. 

"  It  is,"  said  he,  musingly,  "  a  well-known  thing,  that  par- 
ticular drugs  or  herbs  suit  the  body  according  to  its  particular 
diseases.  When  we  are  ill,  we  clon't  open  our  medicine-chest 
at  random,  and  take  out  any  powder  or  phial  that  comes  to 
hand.  The  skilful  doctor  is  he  who  adjusts  the  dose  to  the 
malady." 

K2 


220  THE    CAXTONS  ', 

"Of  that  there  can  be  no  doubt,"  quoth  Captain  Roland. 
"  I  remember  a  notable  instance  of  the  justice  of  what  you  say. 
When  I  was  in  Spain,  both  my  horse  and  I  fell  ill  at  the  same 
time;  a  dose  was  senl  for  each,  and,  by  some  infernal  mistake, 
1  swallowed  the  horse's  physic,  and  the  horse,  poor  thing, 
Swallowed  mine  !" 

"  And  what  was  the  result?"  asked  my  father. 

-The  horse  died!*1  answered  Roland,  mournfully — "a  valu- 
able beast — bright  hay,  with  a  star!" 

-And  you?" 

"  Why,  the  doctor  said  it  ought  to  have  killed  me  ;  but  it 
t<x»k  a  great  deal  more  than  a  paltry  bottle  of  physic  to  kill  a 
man  in  my  regiment." 

"  Nevertheless,  we  arrive  at  the  same  conclusion,"  pursued 
my  lather, — "  I  with  my  theory,  you  with  your  experience, — 
that  the  physic  we  take  must  not  be  chosen  haphazard  ;  and 
that  a  mistake  in  the  bottle  may  kill  a  horse.  But  when  we 
come  to  the  medicine  for  the  mind,  how  little  do  we  think  of 
the  golden  rule  which  common  sense  applies  to  the  body !" 

"  Anan,"  said  the  Captain,  "  what  medicine  is  there  for  the 
mind  ?  Shakespeare  has  said  something  on  that  subject,  which, 
if  I  recollect  right,  implies  that  there  is  no  ministering  to  a 
mind  diseased." 

"I  think  not,  brother ;  he  only  said  physic  (meaning  boluses 
and  black  draughts)  would  not  do  it.  And  Shakespeare  was 
the  last  man  to  find  fault  with  his  own  art ;  for,  verily,  he  has 
been  a  great  physician  to  the  mind." 

"  Ah  !  I  take  you  now,  brother, — books  again  !  So  you 
think  that,  when  a  man  breaks  his  heart,  or  loses  his  fortune, 
or  his  daughter — (Blanche,  child,  come  here) — that  you  have 
only  t<>  clap  a  plaster  of  print  on  the  sore  place,  and  all  is  well. 
I  wish  you  would  find  me  such  a  cure." 

"Will  you  try  it?" 

"If  it  is  not  Greek,"  said  my  uncle. 


A    FAAIILY    PICTUEE.  227 


CHAPTER  V. 

MY   FATHER'S    CEOTCIIET    OX   THE    HYGEIEXIC   CHEMISTRY    OF 

BOOKS. 

"If,"  said  my  father — and  here  his  hand  was  deep  in  his 
waistcoat — "  if  we  accept  the  authority  of  Diodorus,  as  to  the 
inscription  on  the  great  Egyptian  library — and  I  don't  see 
why  Diodorus  should  not  be  as  near  the  mark  as  any  one 
else  ?"  added  my  father,  interrogatively,  turning  round. 

My  mother  thought  herself  the  person  addressed,  and  nod- 
ded her  gracious  assent  to  the  authority  of  Diodorus.  His 
opinion  thus  fortified,  my  lather  continued,  —  "If,  I  say,  we 
accept  the  authority  of  Diodorus,  the  inscription  on  the  Egyp- 
tian library  was — '  The  Medicine  of  the  Mind.'  Now,  that 
phrase  has  become  notoriously  trite  and  hackneyed,  and  peo- 
ple repeat  vaguely  that  books  are  the  medicine  of  the  mind. 
Yes  ;  but  to  apply  the  medicine  is  the  thing  !" 

"  So  you  have  told  us  at  least  twice  before,  brother,"  quoth 
the  Captain,  bluffly.  "  And  what  Diodorus  has  to  do  with  it, 
I  know  no  more  than  the  man  of  the  moon." 

"  I  shall  never  get  on  at  this  rate,"  said  my  father,  in  a  tone 
between  reproach  and  entreaty. 

"Be  good  children,  Roland  and  Blanche  both,"  said  my 
mother,  stopping  from  her  work,  and  holding  uj)  her  needle 
threateningly — and  indeed  inflicting  a  slight  puncture  upon 
the  Captain's  shoulder. 

"Rem  acu  tetigisti,  my  dear,"  said  my  father,  borrowing 
Cicero's  pun  on  the  occasion.*  "And  now  we  shall  go  upon 
velvet.  I  say,  then,  that  books,  taken  indiscriminately,  are  no 
cure  to  the  diseases  and  afflictions  of  the  mind.  There  is  a 
world  of  science  necessary  in  the  taking  them.  I  have  known 
some  people  in  great  sorrow  fly  to  a  novel,  or  the  last  light 
book  in  fashion.  One  might  as  well  take  a  rose-draught  for 
the  plague !  Light  reading  does  not  do  when  the  heart  is 
really  heavy.     I  am  told  that  Goethe,  when  he  lost  his  son, 

*  Cicero's  joke  on  a  senator  who  was  the  son  of  a  tailor — "  Thon  hast 
touched  the  thing  sharply"  (or  with  a  needle — am). 


THE   CAXTONS: 

look  to  study  a  science  that  was  new  to  him.  Ah!  Goethe 
was  a  physician  who  knew  what  he  was  about.  In  a  great 
grief  like  that,  you  cannot  tickle  and  divert  the  mind;  you 
must  wrench  it  away,  abstract,  absorb — bury  it  in  an  abyss, 
hurry  it  into  a  labyrinth.  Therefore,  for  the  irremediable  sor- 
rows  of  middle  life  and  old  age,  I  recommend  a  strict  chronic 
course  of  science  and  hard  reasoning  —  Counter-irritation. 
Bring  the  brain  to  act  upon  the  heart !  If  science  is  too  much 
against  the  grain  (for  we  have  not  all  got  mathematical  heads), 
something  in  the  reach  of  the  humblest  understanding,  but  suf- 
ficiently searching  to  the  highest — a  new  language — Greek, 
Arabic,  Scandinavian,  Chinese,  or  Welsh !  For  the  loss  of  for- 
tune, the  dose  should  be  applied  less  directly  to  the  understand- 
ing.— I  would  administer  something  elegant  and  cordial.  For 
as  the  heart  is  crushed  and  lacerated  by  a  loss  in  the  affections, 
so  it  is  rather  the  head  that  aches  and  suffers  by  the  loss  of 
money.  Here  we  find  the  higher  class  of  poets  a  very  valuable 
remedy.  For  observe  that  poets  of  the  grander  and  more  com- 
prehensive kind  of  genius  have  in  them  two  separate  men, 
quite  distinct  from  each  other — the  imaginative  man,  and  the 
practical,  circumstantial  man ;  and  it  is  the  happy  mixture  of 
these  that  suits  diseases  of  the  mind,  half  imaginative  and  half 
practical.  There  is  Homer,  now  lost  with  the  gods,  now  at 
home  with  the  homeliest,  the  very  'poet  of  circumstance,'  as 
Gray  has  finely  called  him  ;  and  yet  with  imagination  enough 
to  seduce  and  coax  the  dullest  into  forgetting,  for  a  while, 
that  little  spot  on  his  desk  which  his  banker's  book  can  cover. 
There  is  Virgil,  far  below  him,  indeed — 

'  Virgil  the  wise, 
Whose  verse  walks  highest,  but  not  flies,' 

as  Cowley  expresses  it.  But  Virgil  still  has  genius  enough  to 
be  two  men — to  lead  you  into  the  fields,  not  only  to  listen  to 
the  pastoral  reed,  and  to  hear  the  bees  hum,  but  to  note  how 
you  can  make  the  most  of  the  glebe  and  the  vineyard.  There 
is  Horace,  charming  man  of  the  world,  who  will  condole  with 
you  feelingly  on  the  loss  of  your  fortune,  and  by  no  means  un- 
dervalue the  good  things  of  this  life;  but  who  will  yet  show 
you  thai  a  man  may  be  happy  with  a  vile  modicum,  ovparvci 
/•"/•".  There  is  Shakespeare,  who,  above  all  poets,  is  the  mys- 
terious  dual  of  hard  sense  and  empyreal  fancy — and  a  great 
many  more,  whom  I  need  not  name;  but  who,  if  you  take  to 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  229 

them  gently  and  quietly,  will  not,  like  your  mere  philosopher, 
your  unreasonable  stoic,  tell  you  that  you  have  lost  nothing ; 
but  who  will  insensibly  steal  you  out  of  this  world,  with  its 
losses  and  crosses,  and  slip  you  into  another  world,  before  you 
know  where  you  are! — a  world  where  you  are  just  as  wel- 
come, though  you  carry  no  more  earth  of  your  lost  acres  with 
you  than  covers  the  sole  of  your  shoe.  Then,  for  hypochon- 
dria and  satiety,  what  is  better  than  a  brisk  alterative  course 
of  travels — especially  early,  out-of-the-way,  marvellous,  legend- 
ary travels!  How  they  freshen  up  the  spirits!  How  they 
take  you  out  of  the  humdrum  yawning  state  you  are  in.  See, 
with  Herodotus,  young  Greece  spring  up  into  life;  or  note 
with  him  how  already  the  wondrous  old  Orient  world  is  crum- 
bling into  giant  decay ;  or  go  with  Carpini  and  Rubruquis  to 
Tartary,  meet  '  the  carts  of  Zagathai  laden  with  houses,  and 
think  that  a  great  city  is  travelling  towards  you.'*  Gaze  on 
that  vast  wild  empire  of  the  Tartar,  where  the  descendants  of 
Jenghis '  multiply  and  disperse  over  the  immense  waste  desert, 
which  is  as  boundless  as  the  ocean.'  Sail  with  the  early  north- 
ern discoverers,  and  penetrate  to  the  heart  of  winter,  among 
sea-serpents  and  bears,  and  tusked  morses,  with  the  faces  of 
men.  Then,  what  think  you  of  Columbus,  and  the  stern  soul 
of  Cortes,  and  the  kingdom  of  Mexico,  and  the  strange  gold 
city  of  the  Peruvians,  with  that  audacious  brute  Pizarro  ?  and 
the  Polynesians,  just  for  all  the  world  like  the  ancient  Britons  ? 
and  the  American  Indians,  and  the  South-Sea  Islanders  ?  how 
petulant,  and  young,  and  adventurous,  and  frisky  your  hypo- 
chondriac must  get  upon  a  regimen  like  that !  Then,  for  that 
vice  of  the  mind  which  I  call  sectarianism — not  in  the  religious 
sense  of  the  word,  but  little,  narrow  prejudices,  that  make 
you  hate  your  next-door  neighbour,  because  he  has  his  eggs 
roasted  when  you  have  yours  boiled ;  and  gossiping  and  pry- 
ing into  people's  affairs,  and  backbiting,  and  thinking  heaven 
and  earth  are  coming  together,  if  some  broom  touch  a  cobweb 
that  you  have  let  grow  over  the  window-sill  of  your  brains — 
what  like  a  large  and  generous,  mildly  aperient  (I  beg  your 
pardon,  my  dear)  course  of  history!  How  it  clears  away  all 
the  fumes  of  the  head ! — better  than  the  hellebore  with  which 
the  old  leeches  of  the  middle  ages  purged  the  cerebellum. 
There,  amidst  all  that  great  whirl  and  sturmbad  (storm-bath), 
*  Rubruquis,  sect.  xii. 


mi:  CAXTONS: 

as  the  Germans  say,  of  kingdoms  and  empires,  and  races  and 

.  li"\\  your  mind  enlarges  beyond  that  little  feverish  ani- 

mosity  to  John  Styles;  or  that  unfortunate  prepossession  of 

yours,  that   all  the  world   is   interested  in  your   grievances 
against  Tom  Stokes  and  his  wile! 

"  I  can  only  touch,  you  see,  on  a  lew  ingredients  in  this  mag- 
nificent  pharmacy — its  resources  are  boundless,  "but  require  the 
nicest  discretion.  I  remember  to  have  cured  a  disconsolate 
a\  idower,  who  obstinately  refused  every  other  medicament,  by 
a  strict  course  of  geology.  I  dipped  him  deep  into  gneiss  and 
mica-schist.  Amidst  the  first  strata,  I  suffered  the  watery  ac- 
tion to  expend  itself  upon  cooling  crystallized  masses ;  and,  by 
the  time  I  had  got  him  into  the  tertiary  period,  amongst  the 
transition  chalks  of  Maestricht,  and  the  conchiferous  marls  of 
Gosau,  he  was  ready  for  a  new  wife.  Kitty,  my  dear  !  it  is  no 
laughing  matter.  I  made  no  less  notable  a  cure  of  a  young 
scholar  at  Cambridge,  who  was  meant  for  the  church,  when  he 
suddenly  caught  a  cold  tit  of  freethinking,  with  great  shiver- 
ings,  from  wading  out  of  his  depth  in  Spinosa.  None  of  the 
divines,  whom  I  first  tried,  did  him  the  least  good  in  that  state  ; 
so  I  turned  over  a  new  leaf,  and  doctored  him  gently  upon  the 
chapters  of  faith  in  Abraham  Tucker's  book  (you  should  read 
it,  Sisty)  ;  then  I  threw  in  strong  doses  of  Fichte;  after  that  I 
put  him  on  the  Scotch  metaphysicians,  with  plunge-baths  into 
certain  German  transcendentalists  ;  and  having  convinced  him 
that  faith  is  not  an  nnphilosophical  state  of  mind,  and  that  he 
might  believe  without  compromising  his  understanding — for  he 
was  mightily  conceited  on  that  score — I  threw  in  my  divines, 
which  he  was  now  fit  to  digest;  and  his  theological  constitu- 
tion, since  then, has  become  so  robust,  that  he  has  eaten  up  two 
livings  and  a  deanery!  In  fact,  I  have  a  plan  for  a  library 
that,  instead  of  heading  its  compartments,  'Philology,  Natural 
Science,  Poetry,'  etc.,  one  shall  head  them  according  to  the  dis- 
eases for  which  they  are  severally  good,  bodily  and,  mental — 
up  from  a  dire  calamity,  or  the  pangs  of  the  gout,  down  to  a 
lit  of  the  spleen  or  a  slight  catarrh  ;  for  which  last  your  light 
reading  comes  in  with  a  whey-pbssel  and  barley-water.  But," 
continued  my  father,  more  gravely,  "when  some  one  sorrow, 
that  is  yd  reparable,  gets  hold  of  your  mind  like  a  monomania 
— when  you  think,  because  heaven  has  denied  you  this  or  that, 
on   which  you  had  set  your  heart,  that  all  your  life  must  be  a 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  231 

blank — oh !  then  diet  yourself  well  on  biography — the  biogra- 
phy of  good  and  great  men.  See  how  little  a  space  one  sorrow 
really  makes  in  life.  See  scarce  a  page,  perhaps,  given  to  some 
grief  similar  to  your  own ;  and  how  triumphantly  the  life  sails 
on  beyond  it !  You  thought  the  wing  was  broken ! — Tut — 
tut — it  was  but  a  bruised  feather  !  See  what  life  leaves  behind 
it  when  all  is  done ! — a  summary  of  positive  facts  far  out  of  the 
region  of  sorrow  and  suffering,  linking  themselves  with  the  be- 
ing of  the  world.  Yes,  biography  is  the  medicine  here !  Ro- 
land, you  said  you  would  try  my  prescription — here  it  is," — 
and  my  father  took  up  a  book,  and  reached  it  to  the  Captain. 

My  uncle  looked  over  it — Life  of  the  Reverend  Robert  Hall. 
"Brother,  he  was  a  Dissenter,  and,  thank  heaven!  I  am  a 
church-and-state  man  to  the  back-bone !" 

"  Robert  Hall  was  a  brave  man,  and  a  true  soldier  under  the 
Great  Commander,"  said  my  father,  artfully. 

The  Captain  mechanically  carried  his  forefinger  to  his  fore- 
head in  military  fashion,  and  saluted  the  book  respectfully. 

"  I  have  another  copy  for  you,  Pisistratus — that  is  mine  which 
I  have  lent  Roland.  This,  which  I  bought  for  you  to-day,  you 
will  keep." 

"Thank  you,  sir,"  said  I,  listlessly,  not  seeing  what  great 
good  the  Life  of  Robert  Hall  could  do  me,  or  why  the  same 
medicine  should  suit  the  old  weather-beaten  uncle,  and  the 
nephew  yet  in  his  teens. 

"  I  have  said  nothing,"  resumed  my  father,  slightly  bowing 
his  broad  temples,  "  of  the  Book  of  Books,  for  that  is  the  lig- 
num vitce,  the  carnal  medicine  for  all.  These  are  but  the  sub- 
sidiaries :  for,  as  you  may  remember,  my  dear  Kitty,  that  I 
have  said  before — we  can  never  keep  the  system  quite  right 
unless  we  place  just  in  the  centre  of  the  great  ganglionic  sys- 
tem, whence  the  nerves  carry  its  influence  gently  and  smooth- 
ly through  the  Avhole  frame — the  Saffron  Bag  !" 


CHAPTER  VI. 

After  breakfast  the  next  morning,  I  took  my  hat  to  go  out, 
when  my  father,  looking  at  me,  and  seeing  by  my  countenance 
that  I  had  not  slept,  said  gently — 

"  My  dear  Pisistratus,  you  have  not  tried  my  medicine  yet." 


•2?r2  THE   CAXTONS  : 

"  What  medicine,  sir?" 

"Robert  Hall." 

"  N<>,  indeed,  not  yet,"  said  I,  smiling. 

-•!).'  bo,  my  son,  before  you  go  out;  depend  on  it,  you  will 
enjoy  your  walk  more." 

I  confess  that  it  was  with  some  reluctance  I  obeyed.  I  went 
back  to  my  own  room,  and  sate  resolutely  down  to  my  tusk. 
Arc  there  any  of  yon,  my  readers,  who  have  not  read  the  Life 
of  Root  rt  HaU  ?  If  so,  in  the  words  of  the  great  Captain  Cut- 
tle, "  When  found,  make  a  note  of  it."  Never  mind  what  your 
theological  opinion  is — Episcopalian,  Baptist,  Psedobaptist,  In- 
dependent, Quaker,  Unitarian,  Philosopher,  Freethinker, — send 
for  Robert  Hall !  Yea,  if  there  exist  yet  on  earth  descendants 
of  the  arch-heresies,  which  made  such  a  noise  in  their  day — 
men  who  believe  with  Saturninus  that  the  whole  world  was 
made  by  seven  angels ;  or  with  Basilides,  that  there  are  as 
many  heavens  as  there  are  days  in  the  year;  or  with  the  Ni- 
colaitanes,  that  men  ought  to  have  their  wives  in  common  (plen- 
ty of  that  sect  still,  especially  in  the  Red  Republic) ;  or  with 
their  successors,  the  Gnostics,  who  believed  in  Jaldaboath;  or 
with  the  Carpocratians,  that  the  world  was  made  by  the  devil ; 
or  with  the  Cerinthians,  and  Ebionites,  and  Nazarites  (which 
last  discovered  that  the  name  of  Noah's  wife  was  Ouria,  and 
that  she  set  the  ark  on  fire) ;  or  with  the  Valentinians,  who 
taught  that  there  were  thirty  zEones,  ages,  or  worlds,  born  out 
of  Profundity  (Bathos),  male,  and  Silence,  female  ;  or  with  the 
Marcites,  Colarbasii  and  Heraeleonites  (who  still  kept  up  that 
bother  about  JEones,  Mr.  Profundity  and  Mrs.  Silence) ;  or 
with  the  Ophites,  who  are  said  to  have  worshipped  the  ser- 
pent ;  or  the  Cainites,  who  ingeniously  found  out  a  reason  for 
honouring  Judas,  because  he  foresaw  what  good  would  come 
to  men  by  betraying  our  Saviour ;  or  with  the  Sethites,  who 
made  Seth  a  part  of  the  divine  substance;  or  with  the  Arch- 
out  icks,  Ascothyptae,  Cerdonians,  Marcionites,  the  disciples  of 
Apelles,  and  Severus  (the  last  was  a  tee-totaller,  and  said  wine 
was  begot  by  Satan!);  or  of  Tatian,  who  thought  all  the  de- 
scendants of  Adam  were  irretrievably  damned  except  them- 
selves (some  of  thos,.  Tatiani  are  certainly  extant!);  or  the 
Cataphrygians,  who  were  also  called  Tascodragitae,  because 
they  thrust  their  forefingers  up  their  nostrils  to  show  their 
devotion;  or  the  Pepuzians,  Quintilians,  and  Artotyjites;  or 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  233 

— but  no  matter.  If  I  go  through  all  the  follies  of  men  in 
search  of  truth,  I  shall  never  get  to  the  end  of  my  chapter,  or 
back  to  Robert  Hall :  whatever,  then,  thou  art,  orthodox  or 
heterodox,  send  for  the  Life  of  Robert  Hall.  It  is  the  life  of 
a  man  that  it  does  good  to  manhood  itself  to  contemplate. 

I  had  finished  the  biography,  which  is  not  long,  and  was 
musing  over  it,  when  I  heard  the  Captain's  cork-leg  upon  the 
stairs.  I  opened  the  door  for  him,  and  he  entered,  book  in 
hand,  as  I,  also,  book  in  hand,  stood  ready  to  receive  him. 

"  Well,  sir,"  said  Roland,  seating  himself,  "  has  the  prescrip- 
tion done  you  any  good  ?" 

"  Yes,  uncle — great." 

"  And  me,  too.  By  Jupiter,  Sisty,  that  same  Hall  was  a  fine 
fellow !  I  wonder  if  the  medicine  has  gone  through  the  same 
channels  in  both  ?     Tell  me  first  how  it  has  affected  you." 

"Imprimis,  then,  my  dear  uncle,  I  fancy  that  a  book  like 
this  must  do  good  to  all  who  live  in  the  world  in  the  ordinary 
manner,  by  admitting  us  into  a  circle  of  life  of  which  I  suspect 
we  think  but  little.  Here  is  a  man  connecting  himself  direct- 
ly with  a  heavenly  purpose,  and  cultivating  considerable  facul- 
ties to  that  one  end ;  seeking  to  accomplish  his  soul  as  far  as 
he  can,  that  he  may  do  most  good  on  earth,  and  take  a  higher 
existence  up  to  heaven ;  a  man  intent  upon  a  sublime  and  spir- 
itual duty :  in  short,  living  as  it  were  in  it,  and  so  filled  with 
the  consciousness  of  immortality,  and  so  strong  in  the  link  be- 
tween God  and  man,  that,  without  any  affected  stoicism,  with- 
out being  insensible  to  pain — rather,  perhaps,  from  a  nervous 
temperament,  acutely  feeling  it — he  yet  has  a  happiness  wholly 
independent  of  it.  It  is  impossible  not  to  be  thrilled  with  an 
admiration  that  elevates  while  it  awes  you,  in  reading  that  sol- 
emn c  Dedication  of  himself  to  God.'  This  offering;  of  '  soul 
and  body,  time,  health,  reputation,  talents,'  to  the  divine  and 
invisible  Principle  of  Good,  calls  us  suddenly  to  contemplate 
the  selfishness  of  our  own  views  and  hopes,  and  awakens  us 
from  the  egotism  that  exacts  all  and  resigns  nothing. 

"  But  this  book  has  mostly  struck  upon  the  chord  in  my  own 
heart,  in  that  characteristic  which  my  father  indicated  as  be- 
longing to  all  biography.  Here  is  a  life  of  remarkable  fulness, 
great  study,  great  thought,  and  great  action ;  and  yet,"  said  I, 
colouring,  "  how  small  a  space  those  feelings,  which  have  tyran- 
nized over  me,  and  made  all  else  seem  blank  and  void,  hold  in 


23  1  I  in.   '  A.XT0N6  : 

that  life.  It  is  doI  as  if  the  man  were  a  cold  and  hard  ascetic; 
it  is  easy  to  Bee  in  him,no1  only  remarkable  tenderness  and 
warm  affections,  but  Btrong  self-will,  and  the  passion  of  all  vig- 
orous natures.  Yes;  I  understand  better  now  what  existence 
in  a  true  man  should  be." 

"  All  that  is  very  well  said,"  quoth  the  Captain,  "but  it  did 
iK»t  Btrike  me.  What  I  have  seen  in  this  book  is  courage. 
Bere  i-  a  poor  creature  rolling  on  the  carpet  with  agony  ;  from 
childhood  to  death  tortured  by  a  mysterious  incurable  malady 
— a  malady  that  is  described  as  'an  internal  apparatus  of  tor- 
ture;' and  who  does  by  his  heroism,  more  than  bear  it — lie 
puts  it  out  of  power  to  affect  him;  and  though  (here  is  the 
passage)  "his  appointment  by  day  and  by  night  was  incessant 
pain,  yet  high  enjoyment  was,  notwithstanding,  the  law  of  his 
existence.'  Robert  Hall  reads  me  a  lesson — me,  an  old  soldier, 
who  thought  myself  above  taking  lessons — in  courage,  at  least. 
And,  as  I  came  to  that  passage  when,  in  the  sharp  paroxysms 
before  death,  he  says,  'I  have  not  complained,  have  I,  sir? — 
and  I  won't  complain  !' — when  I  came  to  that  passage  I  start- 
ed up,  and  cried,  'Roland  de  Caxton,  thou  hast  been  a  cow- 
ard !  and,  an  thou  hadst  had  thy  deserts,  thou  hadst  been  cash- 
iered, broken,  and  drummed  out  of  the  regiment  long  ago!'" 

"  After  all,  then,  my  lather  was  not  so  wrong — he  placed  his 
guns  right,  and  fired  a  good  shot." 

"He  must  have  been  from  6°  to  9°  above  the  crest  of  the 
parapet,"  said  my  uncle,  thoughtfully — "which,  I  take  it,  is  the 
best  elevation,  both  for  shot  and  shells,  in  enfilading  a  work." 

"  What  say  you,  then,  Captain? — up  with  our  knapsacks, 
and  on  with  the  march  !" 

w-  Right  about — face  !"  cried  my  uncle,  as  erect  as  a  column. 

"  No  looking  back,  if  we  can  help  it." 

"  Full  in  the  front  of  the  enemy.    '  Up,  guards,  and  at  'em  !'" 

••  •  England  expects  every  man  to  do  his  duty!'" 

"Cypress  or  laurel!"  cried  my  uncle,  waving  the  book  over 
his  head. 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  235 


CHAPTER  VII. 

I  wext  out — and  to  see  Francis  Vivian ;  for,  on  leaving  Mr. 
Trevanion,  I  was  not  without  anxiety  for  my  new  friend's  fu- 
ture provision.  But  Vivian  was  from  home,  and  I  strolled 
from  his  lodgings  into  the  suburbs  on  the  other  side  of  the 
river,  and  began  to  meditate  seriously  on  the  best  course  now 
to  pursue.  In  quitting  my  present  occupations,  I  resigned 
prospects  far  more  brilliant,  and  fortunes  far  more  rapid,  than 
I  could  ever  hope  to  realize  in  any  other  entrance  into  life. 
But  I  felt  the  necessity,  if  I  desired  to  keep  steadfast  to  that 
more  healthful  frame  of  mind  I  had  obtained,  of  some  manly 
and  continuous  labour  —  some  earnest  employment.  My 
thoughts  flew  back  to  the  university;  and  the  quiet  of  its 
cloisters,  which,  until  I  had  been  blinded  by  the  glare  of  the 
London  world,  and  grief  had  someAvhat  dulled  the  edge  of  my 
quick  desires  and  hopes,  had  seemed  to  me  cheerless  and  un- 
altering — took  an  inviting  aspect.  It  presented  what  I  needed 
most — a  new  scene,  a  new  arena,  a  partial  return  into  boyhood ; 
repose  for  passions  prematurely  raised ;  activity  for  the  reason- 
ing powers  in  fresh  directions.  I  had  not  lost  my  time  in 
London:  I  had  kept  up,  if  not  studies  purely  classical,  at  least 
the  habits  of  application ;  I  had  sharpened  my  general  com- 
prehension, and  augmented  my  resources.  Accordingly,  when 
I  returned  home,  I  resolved  to  speak  to  my  father.  But  I 
found  he  had  forestalled  me;  and,  on  entering,  my  mother 
drew  me  up-stairs  into  her  room,  with  a  smile  kindled  by  my 
smile,  and  told  me  that  she  and  her  Austin  had  been  thinking 
that  it  was  best  that  I  should  leave  London  as  soon  as  possible  ; 
that  my  father  found  he  could  now  dispense  with  the  library 
of  the  Museum  for  some  months;  that  the  time  for  which 
they  had  taken  their  lodgings  would  be  up  in  a  few  days; 
that  the  summer  was  far  advanced,  town  odious,  the  country 
beautiful — in  a  word,  we  were  to  go  home.  There  I  could 
prepare  myself  for  Cambridge,  till  the  long  vacation  was  over ; 
and  my  mother  added  hesitatingly,  and  with  a  prefatory  cau- 
tion to  spare  my  health,  that  my  father,  whose  income  could 


236  THE   CAXTONB  : 

ill  afford  the  requisite  allowance  to  mo,  counted  on  my  soon 
lightening  his  burden,  by  getting  a  scholarship.  I  felt  how 
much  provident  kindness  there  was  in  all  this — even  in  that 
hint  of  a  scholarship,  which  was  meant  to  rouse  my  faculties, 
and  Bpur  me,  by  affectionate  incentives,  to  a  new  ambition.  I 
was  doI  less  delighted  than  grateful. 

•  But  poor  Roland,"  said  I,  "and  little  Blanche — will  they 
come  with  us?" 

"  1  fear  not,"  said  my  mother,  "  for  Roland  is  anxious  to  get 
hack  to  his  tower ;  and  in  a  day  or  two  he  will  be  well  enough 
to  move." 

"  Do  you  not  think,  my  dear  mother,  that,  somehow  or  other, 
this  lost  son  of  his  had  something  to  do  with  Roland's  illness 
— that  the  illness  was  as  much  mental  as  physical  ?" 

"  I  have  no  doubt  of  it,  Sisty.  What  a  sad,  bad  heart  that 
young  man  must  have !" 

"  My  uncle  seems  to  have  abandoned  all  hope  of  finding  him 
in  London ;  otherwise,  ill  as  he  has  been,  I  am  sure  we  could 
not  have  kept  him  at  home.  So  he  goes  back  to  the  old  tower. 
Poor  man,  he  must  be  dull  enough  there  !  We  must  contrive 
to  pay  him  a  visit.    Does  Blanche  ever  speak  of  her  brother?" 

"  Xo  ;  for  it  seems  they  were  not  brought  up  much  together 
— at  all  events,  she  does  not  remember  him.  How  lovely  she 
is !     Her  mother  must  surely  have  been  very  handsome." 

"  She  is  a  pretty  child,  certainly,  though  in  a  strange  style 
of  beauty — such  immense  eyes ! — and  affectionate,  and  loves 
Roland  as  she  ought." 

And  here  the  conversation  dropped. 

Our  plans  being  thus  decided,  it  was  necessary  that  I  should 
lose  no  time  in  seeing  Vivian,  and  making  some  arrangement 
for  the  future.  His  manner  had  lost  so  much  of  its  abruptness, 
that  I  thought  I  could  venture  to  recommend  him  personally 
to  Trevanion  ;  and  I  knew,  after  what  had  passed,  that  Tre- 
vanion  would  make  a  point  to  oblige  me.  I  resolved  to  con- 
sult my  father  about  it.  As  yet,  I  had  either  never  found,  or 
never  made  the  opportunity  to  talk  to  my  father  on  the  sub- 
ject, he  had  been  so  occupied;  and,  if  he  had  proposed  to  see 
my  new  friend,  what  answer  could  I  have  made,  in  the  teeth 
"I  Vivian's  cynic  objections?  However,  as  we  were  now  go- 
ing  away,  that  last  consideration  ceased  to  be  of  importance ; 
and.  for  the  firSt,  tli<-  student  had  not  yet  entirely  settled  back 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  237 

to  his  books.  I  therefore  watched  the  time  when  my  father 
walked  down  to  the  Museum,  and,  slipping  my  arm  in  his,  I 
told  him,  briefly  and  rapidly,  as  we  went  along,  how  I  had 
formed  this  strange  acquaintance,  and  how  I  was  now  situated. 
The  story  did  not  interest  my  father  quite  so  much  as  I  ex- 
pected, and  he  did  not  understand  all  the  complexities  of 
Vivian's  character — how  could  he? — for  he  answered  briefly, 
"  I  should  think  that,  for  a  young  man,  apparently  without  a 
sixpence,  and  whose  education  seems  so  imperfect,  any  resource 
in  Trevanion  must  be  temporary  and  uncertain.  Speak  to  your 
Uncle  Jack — he  can  find  him  some  place,  I  have  no  doubt — 
perhaps  a  readership  in  a  printer's  office,  or  a  reporter's  place 
on  some  journal,  if  he  is  fit  for  it.  But  if  you  want  to  steady 
him,  let  it  be  something  regular." 

Therewith  my  father  dismissed  the  matter,  and  vanished 
through  the  gates  of  the  Museum.  Readership  to  a  printer — 
report ership  on  a  journal— for  a  young  gentleman  with  the 
high  notions  and  arrogant  vanity  of  Francis  Vivian — his  am- 
bition already  soaring  far  beyond  kid  gloves  and  a  cabriolet ! 
The  idea  was  hopeless ;  and,  perplexed  and  doubtful,  I  took 
my  way  to  Vivian's  lodgings.  I  found  him  at  home,  and  un- 
employed, standing  by  his  window,  with  folded  arms,  and  in 
a  state  of  such  reverie  that  he  was  not  aware  of  my  entrance 
till  I  had  touched  him  on  the  shoulder. 

"  Ha !"  said  he  then,  with  one  of  his  short,  quick,  impatient 
sighs,  "I  thought  you  had  given  me  up,  and  forgotten  me  — 
but  you  look  pale  and  harassed.  I  could  almost  think  you  had 
grown  thinner  within  the  last  few  days." 

"  Oh  !  never  mind  me,  Vivian :  I  have  come  to  speak  of 
yourself.  I  have  left  Trevanion ;  it  is  settled  that  I  should  go 
to  the  university — and  we  all  quit  town  in  a  few  days." 

"  In  a  few  days  ! — all ! — who  are  all  ?" 

"  My  family — father,  mother,  uncle,  cousin,  and  myself.  But, 
my  dear  fellow,  now  let  us  think  seriously  what  is  best  to  be 
done  for  you.     I  can  present  you  to  Trevanion." 

"Ha!" 

"  But  Trevanion  is  a  hard,  though  an  excellent  man ;  and, 
moreover,  as  he  is  always  changing  the  subjects  that  engross 
him,  in  a  month  or  so  he  may  have  nothing  to  give  you.  You 
said  you  would  work — will  you  consent  not  to  complain  if  the 
work  cannot  be  done  in  kid  gloves  ?     Young  men  who  have 


238  nil-:   CAXTONS: 

risen  high  in  the  world  have  begun,  il  is  well  known,  a>  report- 
era  to  the  press.  It  i-  a  situation  of  respectability,  and  in  re- 
quest, and  nol  easy  to  obtain, I  fancy;  but  still — " 

Vivian  interrupted  me  hastily — 

"Thank  you  a  thousand  times!  but  what  you  say  confirms 
a  resolution  I  had  taken  before  you  eame.  I  shall  make  it  up 
with  my  family,  and  return  home." 

k>  Oh  !  I  am  so  really  glad.     How  wise  in  you!" 

Vivian  turned  away  his  head  abruptly — 

"  Your  pictures  of  family  life  and  domestic  peace,  you  see," 
he  said,  "  seduced  me  more  than  you  thought.  When  do  you 
leave  town  ?" 

"  Why,  I  believe,  early  next  week." 

"So  soon,"  said  Vivian,  thoughtfully.  "Well,  perhaps  I 
may  ask  you  to  introduce  me  to  Mr.  Trevanion  ;  for — who 
knows  ? — my  family  and  I  may  fall  out  again.  But  I  will  con- 
sider. I  think  I  have  heard  you  say  that  this  Trevanion  is  a 
very  old  friend  of  your  father's  or  uncle's  ?" 

"  He,  or  rather  Lady  Ellinor,  is  an  old  friend  of  both." 

"And  therefore  would  listen  to  your  recommendations  of 
me.  But  perhaps  I  may  not  need  them.  So  you  have  left — 
let'i  of  your  own  accord — a  situation  that  seemed  more  enjoy- 
able, I  should  think,  than  rooms  in  a  college; — left — why  did 
you  leave  ?" 

And  Vivian  fixed  his  bright  eyes  full  and  piercingly  on 
mine. 

"  It  was  only  for  a  time,  for  a  trial,  that  I  was  there,"  said  I, 
evasively  ;  "  out  at  nurse,  as  it  were,  till  the  Alma  Mater  open- 
ed her  arms — alma  indeed  she  ought  to  be  to  my  father's 
son." 

Vivian  looked  unsatisfied  with  my  explanation,  but  did  not 
question  me  farther.  He  himself  was  the  first  to  turn  the  con- 
versation, and  he  did  this  with  more  affectionate  cordiality 
than  was  common  to  him.  He  inquired  into  our  general  plans, 
into  the  probabilities  of  our  return  to  town,  and  drew  from  me 
a  description  of  our  rural  Tusculum.  lie  was  quiet  and  sub- 
dued; and  once  or  twice  I  thought  there  was  a  moisture  in 
those  luminous  eyes.  We  parted  with  more  of  the  unreserve 
and  fondness  of  youthful  friendship — at  least  on  my  part,  and 
mingly  on  his — than  had  yet  endeared  our  singular  intima- 
cy ;  lor  the  cement  of  cordial  attachment  had  been  wanting  to 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  239 

an  intercourse  in  which  one  party  refused  all  confidence,  and 
the  other  mingled  distrust  and  fear  with  keen  interest  and 
compassionate  admiration. 

That  evening,  before  lights  were  brought  in,  my  father, 
turning  to  me,  abruptly  asked  if  I  had  seen  my  friend,  and 
what  he  was  about  to  do. 

"  He  thinks  of  returning  to  his  family,"  said  I. 

Roland,  who  had  seemed  dozing,  winced  uneasily. 

"  Who  returns  to  his  family  ?"  asked  the  Captain. 

"  Why,  you  must  know,"  said  my  father,  "  that  Sisty  has 
fished  up  a  friend  of  whom  he  can  give  no  account  that  would 
satisfy  a  policeman,  and  whose  fortunes  he  thinks  himself  un- 
der the  necessity  of  protecting.  You  are  very  lucky  that  he 
has  not  picked  your  pockets,  Sisty ;  but  I  dare  say  he  has  ? 
What's  his  name  ?" 

"  Vivian,"  said  I, — u  Francis  Vivian." 

"  A  good  name,  and  a  Cornish,"  said  my  father.  "  Some 
derive  it  from,  the  Romans — Vivianus  ;  others  from  a  Celtic 
word,  which  means" — 

"  Vivian  !"  interrupted  Roland — "  Vivian  ! — I  wonder  if  it 
be  the  son  of  Colonel  Vivian  ?" 

"  He  is  certainly  a  gentleman's  son,"  said  I ;  "  but  he  never 
told  me  what  his  family  and  connections  were." 

"  Vivian,"  repeated  my  uncle — "  poor  Colonel  Vivian  !  So 
the  young  man  is  going  to  his  father.  I  have  no  doubt  it  is  the 
same.     Ah  !" — 

"  What  do  you  know  of  Colonel  Vivian  or  his  son  ?"  said  I. 
"  Pray  tell  me  ;  I  am  so  interested  in  this  young  man." 

"  I  know  nothing  of  either,  except  by  gossip,"  said  my  uncle 
moodily.  "  I  did  hear  that  Colonel  Vivian,  an  excellent  officer 
and  honourable  man,  had  been  in — in — (Roland's  voice  falter- 
ed)— in  great  grief  about  his  son,  whom,  a  mere  boy,  he  had 
prevented  from  some  improper  marriage,  and  who  had  run 
away  and  left  him — it  was  supposed  for  America.  The  story 
affected  me  at  the  time,"  added  my  uncle,  trying  to  speak 
calmly. 

We  were  all  silent,  for  we  felt  why  Roland  was  so  disturbed, 
and  why  Colonel  Vivian's  grief  should  have  touched  him  home. 
Similarity  in  affliction  makes  us  brothers  even  to  the  unknown. 

"  You  say  he  is  going  home  to  his  family — I  am  heartily  glad 
of  it !"  said  the  envying  old  soldier,  gallantly. 


240  THE   CAXTONS. 

The  lights  came  in  then,  and  two  minutes  after,  Uncle  Ro- 
land and  I  were  nestled  dose  10  cacli  other,  side  by  side  ;  and 
I  was  reading  over  his  shoulder,  and  his  finger  was  silently 
resting  on  thai  passage  that  had  so  struck  him — "I  have  not 
complained — have  I,  sir? — and  I  won't  complain  !" 


PART  TENTH. 

CHAPTER  I. 

My  uncle's  conjecture  as  to  the  parentage  of  Francis  Vivian 
seemed  to  me  a  positive  discovery.  Nothing  more  likely  than 
that  this  wilful  boy  had  formed  some  headstrong  attachment 
which  no  father  would  sanction,  and  so,  thwarted  and  irritated, 
thrown  himself  on  the  world.  Such  an  explanation  was  the 
more  agreeable  to  me,  as  it  cleared  up  much  that  had  appeared 
discreditable  in  the  mystery  that  surrounded  Vivian.  I  could 
never  bear  to  think  that  he  had  done  anything  mean  and  crim- 
inal, however  I  might  believe  he  had  been  rash  and  faulty.  It 
was  natural  that  the  unfriended  wanderer  should  have  been 
thrown  into  a  society,  the  equivocal  character  of  which  had 
failed  to  revolt  the  audacity  of  an  inquisitive  mind  and  adven- 
turous temper ;  but  it  was  natural,  also,  that  the  habits  of  gen- 
tle birth,  and  that  silent  education  which  English  gentlemen 
commonly  receive  from  their  very  cradle,  should  have  preserved 
his  honour,  at  least,  intact  through  all.  Certainly  the  pride, 
the  notions,  the  very  faults  of  the  well-born  had  remained  in 
full  force — why  not  the  better  qualities,  however  smothered  for 
the  time  ?  I  felt  thankful  for  the  thought  that  Vivian  was  re- 
turning to  an  element  in  which  he  might  repurify  his  mind, — 
refit  himself  for  that  sphere  to  which  he  belonged ; — thankful 
that  Ave  might  yet  meet,  and  our  present  half-intimacy  mature, 
perhaps,  into  healthful  friendship. 

It  was  with  such  thoughts  that  I  took  up  my  hat  the  next 
morning  to  seek  Vivian,  and  judge  if  we  had  gained  the  right 
clue,  when  we  were  startled  by  what  was  a  rare  sound  at  our 
door — the  postman's  knock.  My  father  was  at  the  Museum ; 
my  mother  in  high  conference,  or  close  preparation  for  our  ap- 
proaching departure,  with  Mrs.  Primmins;  Roland,  I,  and 
Blanche  had  the  room  to  ourselves. 

"  The  letter  is  not  for  me,"  said  Pisistratus. 

"  N"or  for  me,  I  am  sure,"  said  the  Captain,  when  the  servant 
entered  and  confuted  him — for  the  letter  was  for  him.    He  took 

I 


242  Tin-;  CAXT0NS : 

it  op  wonderingly  and  suspiciously,  as  Glumdalclitch  took  up 
Gulliver,  or  as  (if naturalists)  we  lake  up  an  unknown  creature, 
thai  we  arc  not  quite  sure  will  not  bite  and  sting  us.  Ah!  it 
has  stung  or  bit  you,  Captain  Roland !  for  you  start  and  change 
colour — you  suppress  a  cry  as  you  break  the  seal — you  breathe 
hard  as  you  read — and  the  letter  seems  short — "but  it  takes  time 
in  the  reading,  for  you  go  over  it  again  and  again.  Then  you 
fold  it  up — crumple  it — thrust  it  into  your  breast-pocket — and 
look  round  like  a  man  waking  from  a  dream.  Is  it  a  dream 
of  pain  or  of  pleasure  ?  Verily,  I  cannot  guess,  for  nothing  is 
on  that  eagle  face  either  of  pain  or  pleasure,  but  rather  of  fear, 
agitation,  bewilderment.  Yet  the  eyes  are  bright,  too,  and 
there  is  a  smile  on  that  iron  lip. 

My  uncle  looked  round,  I  say,  and  called  hastily  for  his  cane 
and  his  hat,  and  then  began  buttoning  his  coat  across  his  broad 
breast,  though  the  day  was  hot  enough  to  have  unbuttoned  ev- 
ery breast  in  the  metropolis. 

"You  are  not  going  out,  uncle?" 

"  Yes,  yes." 

"  But  are  you  strong  enough  yet  ?     Let  me  go  with  you." 

"  No,  sir ;  no.  Blanche,  come  here."  He  took  the  child  in 
his  arms,  surveyed  her  wistfully,  and  kissed  her.  "  You  have 
never  given  me  pain,  Blanche :  say,  '  God  bless  and  prosper 
you,  father !' " 

"  God  bless  and  prosper  my  dear,  dear  papa  !"  said  Blanche, 
putting  her  little  hands  together,  as  if  in  prayer. 

"  There — that  should  bring  me  luck,  Blanche,"  said  the  Cap- 
tain, gaily,  and  setting  her  down.  Then  seizing  his  cane  from 
the  servant,  and  putting  on  his  hat  with  a  determined  air,  he 
walked  stoutly  forth ;  and  I  saw  him,  from  the  window,  march 
along  the  streets  as  cheerfully  as  if  he  had  been  besieging  Ba- 
dajoz. 

"  God  prosper  thee,  too  !"  said  I,  involuntarily. 

And  Blanche  took  hold  of  my  hand,  and  said  in  her  prettiest 
way  (and  her  pretty  ways  were  many),  "  I  wish  you  would 
come  with  us,  cousin  Sisty,  and  help  me  to  love  papa.  Poor 
papa!  he  wants  us  both — lie  wants  all  the  love  we  can  give 
hi 


mn 


1" 


"  That  he  does,  my  dear  Blanche ;  and  T  think  it  a  great  mis- 
take that  we  don't  all  live  together.     Your  papa  ought  not  to 
to  that  tower  of  his  at  the  world's  end,  but  come  to  our 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  243 

snug,  pretty  house,  with  a  garden  full  of  flowers,  for  you  to  be 
Queen  of  the  May — from  May  to  November ;  to  say  nothing 
of  a  duck  that  is  more  sagacious  than  any  creature  in  the  Fa- 
bles I  gave  you  the  other  day." 

Blanche  laughed  and  clapped  her  hands — "  Oh,  that  would 
be  so  nice !  But," — and  she  stopped  gravely,  and  added,  "but 
then,  you  see,  there  would  not  be  the  tower  to  love  papa ;  and 
I  am  sure  that  the  tower  must  love  him  very  much,  for  he  loves 
it  dearly." 

It  was  my  turn  to  laugh  now.  "  I  see  how  it  is,  you  little 
witch !"  said  I ;  "  you  would  coax  us  to  come  and  live  with 
you  and  the  owls !  With  all  my  heart,  so  far  as  I  am  con- 
cerned." 

"  Sisty,"  said  Blanche,  with  an  appalling  solemnity  on  her 
face,  "  do  you  know  what  I've  been  thinking  ?" 

"  Not  I,  miss — what? — something  very  deep, I  can  see — very 
horrible,  indeed,  I  fear — you  look  so  serious." 

"  Why,  I've  been  thinking,"  continued  Blanche,  not  relaxing 
a  muscle,  and  without  the  least  bit  of  a  blush — "  I've  been 
thinking  that  I'll  be  your  little  wife ;  and  then,  of  course,  we 
shall  all  live  together." 

Blanche  did  not  blush,  but  I  did.  "  Ask  me  that  ten  years 
hence,  if  you  dare,  you  impudent  little  thing ;  and  now  run 
away  to  Mrs.  Primmins,  and  tell  her  to  keep  you  out  of  mis- 
chief, for  I  must  say  '  good  morning.'  " 

But  Blanche  did  not  run  away,  and  her  dignity  seemed  ex- 
ceedingly hurt  at  my  mode  of  taking  her  alarming  proposition, 
for  she  retired  into  a  corner  pouting,  and  sat  down  with  great 
majesty.  So  there  I  left  her,  and  went  my  way  to  Vivian. 
He  was  out ;  but,  seeing  books  on  his  table,  and  having  noth- 
ing to  do,  I  resolved  to  Avait  for  his  return.  I  had  enough  of 
my  father  in  me  to  turn  at  once  to  the  books  for  company ; 
and,  by  the  side  of  some  graver  works  which  I  had  recom- 
mended, I  found  certain  novels  in  French,  that  Vivian  had  got 
from  a  circulating  library.  I  had  a  curiosity  to  read  these — 
for,  except  the  old  classic  novels  of  France,  this  mighty  branch 
of  its  popular  literature  was  new  to  me.  I  soon  got  interest- 
ed, but  what  an  interest ! — the  interest  that  a  nightmare  might 
excite,  if  one  caught  it  out  of  one's  sleep,  and  set  to  wTork  to 
examine  it.  By  the  side  of  what  dazzling  shrewdness,  what 
deep  knowledge  of  those  holes  and  corners  in  the  human  sys- 


2  1  t  l  1 1 1 :  «  \  \  i  <  i  \  S  : 

tern,  of  which  Goethe  must  have  Bpoken  when  he  said  some- 
when — (if  I  recoiled  right,  and  don't  misquote  him,  which 
I'll  not  answer  lor) — "There  is  something  in  every  man's  heart 
which,  if  we  could  know,  would  make  us  hate  him," — by  the 
side  of  all  this,  and  of  much  more  that  showed  prodigious 
boldness  and  energy  of  intellect,  what  strange  exaggeration — 
what  mock  nobility  of  sentiment — what  inconceivable  perver- 
sion of  reasoning — what  damnable  demoralization !  The  true 
artist,  whether  in  Romance  or  the  Drama,  will  often  necessa- 
rily interest  us  in  a  vicious  or  criminal  character — but  he  does 
not  the  less  leave  clear  to  our  reprobation  the  vice  or  the 
crime.  But  here  I  found  myself  called  upon  not  only  to  feel 
interest  in  the  villain  (which  would  be  perfectly  allowable, — I 
am  very  much  interested  in  Macbeth  and  Lovelace), — but  to 
admire  and  sympathize  with  the  villany  itself.  Nor  was  it  the 
confusion  of  all  wrong  and  right  in  individual  character  that 
shocked  me  the  most — but  rather  the  view  of  society  altogeth- 
er, painted  in  colours  so  hideous  that,  if  true,  instead  of  a  rev- 
olution, it  would  draw  down  a  deluge; — it  was  the  hatred, 
carefully  instilled,  of  the  poor  against  the  rich — it  was  the  war 
breathed  between  class  and  class — it  was  that  envy  of  all  supe- 
riorities, which  loves  to  show  itself  by  allowing  virtue  only  to 
a  blouse,  and  asserting  that  a  man  must  be  a  rogue  if  he  be- 
long to  that  rank  of  society  in  which,  from  the  very  gifts  of  edu- 
cation, from  the  necessary  associations  of  circumstance,  rogue- 
ry is  the  last  thing  probable  or  natural.  It  was  all  this,  and 
things  a  thousand  times  worse,  that  set  my  head  in  a  whirl,  as 
hour  after  hour  slipped  on,  and  I  still  gazed,  spell-bound,  on 
these  Chimeras  and  Typhons — these  symbols  of  the  Destroy- 
ing Principle.  "Poor  Vivian  !"  said  I,  as  I  rose  at  last,  "if 
thou  readest  these  books  with  pleasure,  or  from  habit,  no  won- 
der that  thou  seemest  to  me  so  obtuse  about  right  and  wrong, 
and  to  have  a  great  cavity  where  thy  brain  should  have  the 
bump  of  '  conscientiousness'  in  full  salience  !" 

Nevertheless,  to  do  those  demoniacs  justice,  I  had  got 
through  time  imperceptibly  by  their  pestilent  help;  and  I  Avas 
Btartled  to  see,  by  my  watch,  how  late  it  was.  I  had  just  re- 
solved to  leave  a  line  fixing  an  appointment  for  the  morrow, 
and  so  depart,  when  I  heard  Vivian's  knock — a  knock  that 
had  great  character  in  it — haughty,  impatient,  irregular;  not 
a  neat,  symmetrical,  harmonious,  unpretending  knock,  but  a 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  245 

knock  that  seemed  to  set  the  whole  house  and  street  at  defi- 
ance :  it  was  a  knock  bullying — a  knock  ostentatious — a  knock 
irritating  and  offensive — "  impiger,"  and  "  iracundus." 

But  the  step  that  came  up  the  stairs  did  not  suit  the  knock ! 
it  was  a  step  light,  yet  firm — slow,  yet  elastic. 

The  maid-servant  who  had  opened  the  door  had,  no  doubt, 
informed  Vivian  of  my  visit,  for  he  did  not  seem  surprised  to 
see  me;  but  he  cast  that  hurried  suspicious  look  round  the 
room  which  a  man  is  apt  to  cast  when  he  has  left  his  papers 
about,  and  finds  some  idler,  on  whose  trustworthiness  he  by 
no  means  depends,  seated  in  the  midst  of  the  unguarded  se- 
crets. The  look  was  not  flattering ;  but  my  conscience  was  so 
unreproachful  that  I  laid  all  the  blame  upon  the  general  sus- 
piciousness of  Vivian's  character. 

"  Three  hours,  at  least,  have  I  been  here  !"  said  I,  mali- 
ciously. 

"  Three  hours  !" — again  the  look. 

"  And  this  is  the  worst  secret  I  have  discovered,"  and  I 
pointed  to  those  literary  Manicheans. 

"Oh!"  said  he,  carelessly,  "French  novels  ! — I  don't  wonder 
you  stayed  so  long.  I  can't  read  your  English  novels — flat 
and  insipid  :  there  are  truth  and  life  here." 

"  Truth  and  life !"  cried  I,  every  hair  on  my  head  erect  with 
astonishment — "  then  hurrah  for  falsehood  and  death  !" 

"  They  don't  please  you  ;  no  accounting  for  tastes." 

"  I  beg  your  pardon — I  account  for  yours,  if  you  really  take 
for  truth  and  life  monsters  so  nefast  and  flagitious.  For  heav- 
en's sake,  my  dear  fellow,  don't  suppose  that  any  man  could 
get  on  in  England — get  anywhere  but  to  the  Old  Bailey  or 
Xorfolk  Island — if  he  squared  his  conduct  to  such  topsy-turvy 
notions  of  the  world  as  I  find  here." 

"  How  many  years  are  you  my  senior,"  asked  Vivian,  sneer- 
ingly,  "  that  you  should  play  the  mentor,  and  correct  my  igno- 
rance of  the  world?" 

"Vivian,  it  is  not  age  and  experience  that  speak  here,  it  is 
something  far  wiser  than  they — the  instinct  of  a  man's  heart, 
and  a  gentleman's  honour." 

"  Well,  well,"  said  Vivian,  rather  discomposed,  "  let  the  poor 
books  alone:  you  know  my  creed — that  books  influence  us 
little  one  way  or  the  other." 

"  By  the  great  Egyptian  library,  and  the  soul  of  Diodorus! 


THE   CAXTONS: 

I  wish  y«>u  could  hear  my  father  upon  that  point.     Come," 

sai-1  I.  will;  sublime  compassion — "come,  it  is  not  too  late — 
do  Lei  me  introduce  you  to  my  father.  I  will  consent  to  read 
French  novels  all  my  life,  if  a  single  chat  with  Austin  Caxton 
does  not  Bend  you  home  with  a  happier  face  and  a  lighter 
heart.     Come,  lei  me  take  you  back  to  dine  with  us  to-day." 

tk  I  cannot,"  sai<l  Vivian,  with  some  confusion — "I  cannot, 
for  this  day  I  leave  London.  Some  other  time  perhaps — for," 
he  added,  but  not  heartily,  "  we  may  meet  again." 

"  I  hope  so,"  said  I,  wringing  his  hands,  "  and  that  is  likely, 
— since,  in  spite  of  yourself,  I  have  guessed  your  secret — your 
birth  and  parentage." 

"  How !"  cried  Vivian,  turning  pale,  and  gnawing  his  lip — 
"  what  do  you  mean? — speak." 

"  Well,  then,  are  you  not  the  lost,  runaway  son  of  Colonel 
Vivian  ?     Come,  say  the  truth  ;  let  us  be  confidants." 

Vivian  threw  off  a  succession  of  his  abrupt  sighs  ;  and  then, 
seating  himself,  leant  his  face  on  the  table,  confused,  no  doubt, 
to  find  himself  discovered. 

"  You  are  near  the  mark,"  said  he,  at  last,  "  but  do  not  ask 
me  farther  yet.  Some  day,"  he  cried,  impetuously,  and  spring- 
ing suddenly  to  his  feet — "  some  day  you  shall  know  all :  yes ; 
some  day,  if  I  live,  when  that  name  shall  be  high  in  the  world : 
yes,  when  the  world  is  at  my  feet!"  He  stretched  his  right 
hand  as  if  to  grasp  the  space,  and  his  whole  face  was  lighted 
with  a  fierce  enthusiasm.  The  glow  died  away,  and,  with  a 
slight  return  of  his  scornful  smile,  he  said — "Dreams  yet; 
dreams  !  And  now,  look  at  this  paper."  And  he  drew  out  a 
memorandum,  scrawled  over  with  figures. 

"  This,  I  think,  is  my  pecuniary  debt  to  you  ;  in  a  few  days 
I  shall  discharge  it.     Give  me  your  address." 

"Oh!"  said  I,  pained,  " can  you  speak  to  me  of  monev, 
Vivian?" 

"  It  is  one  of  those  instincts  of  honour  you  cite  so  often," 
answered  he,  colouring.     "Pardon  me." 

"That  is  my  address,"  said  I,  stooping  to  write,  in  order  to 
conceal  my  wounded  feelings.  t%  You  will  avail  yourself  of  it, 
I  hope,  often,  and  tell  me  that  you  are  well  and  happy." 

"When  I  am  happy  you  shall  know." 

"  You  do  not  require  an  introduction  to  Trevanion  ?" 

Vivian  hesitated.  "No,  I  think  not.  If  ever  I  do,  I  will 
write  for  it." 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  247 

I  took  up  my  bat,  and  was  about  to  go — for  I  was  still  chill- 
ed and  mortified — when,  as  if  by  an  irresistible  impulse,  Vivian 
came  to  me  hastily,  flung  his  arms  round  my  neck,  and  kissed 
me  as  a  boy  kisses  his  brother. 

"Bear  with  me!"  he  cried,  in  a  faltering  voice:  "I  did  not 
think  to  love  any  one  as  you  have  made  me  love  you,  though 
sadly  against  the  grain.  If  you  are  not  my  good  angel,  it  is 
that  nature  and  habit  are  too  strong  for  you.  Certainly,  some 
day  we  shall  meet  again.  I  shall  have  time,  in  the  mean  while, 
to  see  if  the  world  can  be  indeed  '  mine  oyster,  which  I  with 
sword  can  open.'  I  would  be  aut  Ccesar  aut  melius  !  Very 
little  other  Latin  know  I  to  quote  from !  If  Caesar,  men  will 
forgive  me  all  the  means  to  the  end ;  if  nullus,  London  has  a 
river,  and  in  every  street  one  may  buy  a  cord !" 

"Vivian!  Vivian!" 

"  Now  go,  my  dear  friend,  while  my  heart  is  softened — go, 
before  I  shock  you  with  some  return  of  the  native  Adam.  Go 
-go !" 

And  taking  me  gently  by  the  arm,  Francis  Vivian  drew  me 
from  the  room,  and,  re-entering,  locked  his  door. 

Ah !  if  I  could  have  left  him  Robert  Hall  instead  of  those  ex- 
ecrable Typhons !  But  would  that  medicine  have  suited  his 
case,  or  must  grim  Experience  write  sterner  prescriptions  with 
iron  hand  ? 


CHAPTER  II. 

TThex  I  got  back,  just  in  time  for  dinner,  Roland  had  not 
returned,  nor  did  he  return  till  late  in  the  evening.  All  our 
eyes  were  directed  towards  him,  as  we  rose  with  one  accord 
to  give  him  welcome;  but  his  face  was  like  a  mask — it  was 
locked,  and  rigid,  and  unreadable. 

Shutting  the  door  carefully  after  him,  he  came  to  the  hearth, 
stood  on  it,  upright  and  calm,  for  a  few  moments,  and  then 
asked — 

"Has  Blanche  gone  to  bed  ?" 

"  Yes,"  said  my  mother,  "  but  not  to  sleep,  I  am  sure ;  she 
made  me  promise  to  tell  her  when  you  came  back." 

Roland's  brow  relaxed. 


1  -  i  ii i:  <  wi'ons: 

"To-morrow.  Bister,"  said  lie,  slowly,  "will  you  see  that  Bhe 
lias  the  proper  mourning  made  for  her?     My  son  is  dead." 

"Dead  !"  we  cried  with  one  voice,  and  surrounding  him  with 
one  impulse. 

"  1  >ead  !  impossible — you  could  not  say  it  so  calmly.  Dead 
— how  do  you  know  ?  You  may  be  deceived.  Who  told  you  ? 
— why  do  you  think  so?" 

"  I  have  seen  his  remains,"  said  my  uncle,  with  the  same 
gloomy  calm.  "  We  will  all  mourn  for  him.  Pisistratus,  you 
are  heir  to  my  name  now,  as  to  your  father's.  Good-night ; 
excuse  me,  all — all  you  dear  and  kind  ones ;  I  am  worn  out." 

Roland  lighted  his  candle  and  Avent  away,  leaving  us  thun- 
der-struck ;  but  he  came  back  again — looked  round — took  up 
his  book,  open  in  the  favourite  passage — nodded  again,  and 
again  vanished.  "We  looked  at  each  other  as  if  we  had  seen  a 
ghost.  Then  my  father  rose  and  went  out  of  the  room,  and 
remained  in  Roland's  till  the  night  was  wellnigh  gone !  We 
sat  up — my  mother  and  I — till  he  returned.  His  benign  face 
looked  profoundly  sad. 

"  How  is  it,  sir  ?     Can  you  tell  us  more  ?" 

My  father  shook  his  head. 

"  Roland  prays  that  you  may  preserve  the  same  forbearance 
you  have  shown  hitherto,  and  never  mention  his  son's  name  to 
him.  Peace  be  to  the  living  as  to  the  dead.  Kitty,  this 
changes  our  plans  ;  we  must  all  go  to  Cumberland — we  cannot 
leave  Roland  thus !" 

"Poor,  poor  Roland!"  said  my  mother,  through  her  tears. 
"  And  to  think  that  father  and  son  were  not  reconciled.  But 
Roland  forgives  him  now — oh  yes;  now!" 

"  It  is  not  Roland  we  can  censure,"  said  my  father,  almost 
fiercely;  "it  is — but  enough.  We  must  hurry  out  of  town  as 
soon  as  Ave  can:  Roland  will  recover  in  the  native  air  of  his 
old  ruins." 

We  went  tip  to  bed  mournfully.  "And  so,"  thought  I,  "ends 
i  He  grand  object  of  my  life! — I  had  hoped  to  have  brought 
those  two  together.  But,  alas!  what  peacemaker  like  the 
-rave!" 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  249 


CHAPTER  III. 

My  uncle  did  not  leave  his  room  for  three  days,  but  he  was 
much  closeted  with  a  lawyer;  and  my  father  dropped  some 
words  that  seemed  to  imply  that  the  deceased  had  incurred 
debts,  and  that  the  jioor  Captain  was  making  some  charge  on 
his  small  property.  As  Roland  had  said  that  he  had  seen  the 
remains  of  his  son,  I  took  it,  at  first,  for  granted  that  we  should 
attend  a  funeral,  but  no  word  of  this  was  said.  On  the  fourth 
day,  Roland,  hi  deep  mourning,  entered  a  hackney-coach  with 
the  lawyer,  and  was  absent  about  two  hours.  I  did  not  doubt 
that  he  had  thus  quietly  fulfilled  the  last  mournful  offices.  On 
his  return,  he  shut  himself  up  again  for  the  rest  of  the  day, 
and  would  not  see  even  my  father.  But  the  next  morning  he 
made  his  appearance  as  usual,  and  I  even  thought  that  he 
seemed  more  cheerful  than  I  had  yet  known  him — whether  he 
played  a  part,  or  whether  the  worst  was  now  over,  and  the 
grave  less  cruel  than  uncertainty.  On  the  following  day  we 
all  set  out  for  Cumberland. 

In  the  interval,  Uncle  Jack  had  been  almost  constantly  at 
the  house,  and,  to  do  him  justice,  he  had  seemed  unaffectedly 
shocked  at  the  calamity  that  had  befallen  Roland.  There  was, 
indeed,  no  want  of  heart  in  Uncle  Jack,  whenever  you  went 
straight  at  it ;  but  it  was  hard  to  find  it  if  you  took  a  circui- 
tous route  towards  it  through  the  pockets.  The  worthy  spec- 
ulator had  indeed  much  business  to  transact  with  my  father 
before  he  left  town.  The  Anti- Publisher  Society  had  been  set 
up,  and  it  was  through  the  obstetric  aid  of  that  fraternity  that 
the  Great  Book  was  to  be  ushered  into  the  world.  The  new 
journal,  the  Literary  Times,  was  also  far  advanced — not  yet 
out,  but  my  father  was  fairly  in  for  it.  There  were  prepara- 
tions for  its  debut  on  a  vast  scale, -and  two  or  three  gentlemen 
in  black — one  of  whom  looked  like  a  lawyer,  and  another  like 
a  printer,  and  a  third  uncommonly  like  a  Jew — called  twice 
with  papers  of  a  very  formidable  aspect.  All  these  prelimina- 
ries settled,  the  last  thing  I  heard  Uncle  Jack  say,  with  a  slap 
on  my  father's  back,  was, "  Fame  and  fortune  both  made  now ! 

L2 


250  Tin:  <  AJXTONS  : 

— you  may  go  to  Bleep  in  safety,  for  you  leave  me  wide  awake. 
.lack  Tibbets  never  Bleeps !" 

I  had  thoughl  it  strange  that,  since  my  abrupt  exodus  from 
Trevariion's  house,  no  notice  had  been  taken  of  any  of  us  by 
himself  or  Lady  Ellinor.  But  on  the  very  eve  of  our  depart- 
ure came  a  kind  note  from  Trevanion  to  me,  dated  from  his 
favourite  country  seat  (accompanied  by  a  present  of  some  rare 
book>  t<>  my  father),  in  which  he  said  briefly  that  there  had 
been  illness  in  his  family,  which  had  obliged  him  to  leave  town 
for  a  change  of  air,  but  that  Lady  Ellinor  expected  to  call  on 
my  mother  the  next  week.  He  had  found  amongst  his  books 
some  curious  works  of  the  Middle  Ages,  amongst  others  a 
complete  set  of  Cardan,  which  he  knew  my  father  would  like 
to  have,  and  so  sent  them.  There  was  no  allusion  to  what  had 
passed  between  us. 

In  reply  to  this  note,  after  due  thanks  on  my  father's  part, 
who  seized  upon  the  Cardan  (Lyons  edition,  1663,  ten  volumes 
folio)  as  a  silk-worm  does  upon  a  mulberry-leaf,  I  expressed  our 
joint  regrets  that  there  was  no  hope  of  our  seeing  Lady  Elli- 
nor, as  we  were  just  leaving  town.  I  should  have  added  some- 
thing on  the  loss  my  uncle  had  sustained,  but  my  father  thought 
that,  since  Roland  shrank  from  any  mention  of  his  son,  even 
by  his  nearest  kindred,  it  would  be  his  obvious  wish  not  to  pa- 
rade his  affliction  beyond  that  circle. 

And  there  had  been  illness  in  Trevanion's  family!  On 
whom  had  it  fallen?  I  could  not  rest  satisfied  with  that  gen- 
eral expression,  and  I  took  my  answer  myself"  to  Trevanion's 
house,  instead  of  sending  it  by  the  post.  In  reply  to  my  in- 
quiries, the  porter  said  that  all  the  family  were  expected  at  the 
end  of  the  week ;  that  he  had  heard  both  Lady  Ellinor  and 
]\Iiss  Trevanion  had  been  rather  poorly,  but  that  they  were  now 
better.  I  left  my  note  with  orders  to  forward  it;  and  my 
wounds  bled  afresh  as  I  came  aAvay. 

We  had  the  whole  coach  to  ourselves  in  our  journey,  and  a 
silent  journey  it  was,  till  we  arrived  at  a  little  town  about  eight 
miles  from  my  uncle's  residence,  to  which  we  could  only  get 
through  a  cross-road.  My  uncle  insisted  on  preceding  us  that 
night,  and,  though  he  had  written,  before  we  started,  to  an- 
nounce our  coming,  he  was  fidgety  lest  the  tower  should  not 
make  the  best  figure  it  could;  so  he  went  alone,  and  we  took 
our  ease  at  our  inn. 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  251 

Betimes  the  next  clay  we  hired  a  fly-coach — for  a  chaise 
would  never  have  held  us  and  my  father's  books — and  jogged 
through  a  labyrinth  of  villanous  lanes,  which  no  Marshal  Wade 
had  ever  reformed  from  their  primal  chaos.  But  poor  Mrs. 
Primmins  and  the  canary-bird  alone  seemed  sensible  of  the 
jolts ;  the  former,  who  sat  opposite  to  us  wedged  amidst  a 
medley  of  packages,  all  marked  "  Care,  to  be  kept  top  upper- 
most" (why  I  know  not,  for  they  were  but  books,  and  whether 
they  lay  top  or  bottom  it  could  not  materially  affect  their 
value), — the  former,  I  say,  contrived  to  extend  her  arms  over 
those  disjecta  membra,  and,  griping  a  window-sill  with  the 
right  hand,  and  a  window-sill  with  the  left,  kept  her  seat  ram- 
pant, like  the  split  eagle  of  the  Austrian  Empire — in  fact,  it 
would  be  well  now-a-days  if  the  split  eagle  were  as  firm  as 
Mrs.  Primmins !  As  for  the  canary,  it  never  failed  to  respond, 
by  an  astonished  chirp,  to  every  "Gracious  me!"  and  "Lord 
save  us !"  which  the  delve  into  the  rut,  or  the  bump  out  of  it, 
sent  forth  from  Mrs.  Primmins's  lips,  with  all  the  emphatic 
dolor  of  the  "At,  at!"  in  a  Greek  chorus. 

But  my  father,  with  his  broad  hat  over  his  brows,  was  in 
deep  thought..  The  scenes  of  his  youth  were  rising  before 
him,  and  his  memory  went,  smooth  as  a  spirit's  wing,  over 
delve  and  bump.  And  my  mother,  who  sat  next  him,  had  her 
arm  on  his  shoulder,  and  was  watching  his  face  jealously.  Did 
she  think  that,  in  that  thoughtful  face,  there  was  regret  for  the 
old  love  ?  Blanche,  who  had  been  very  sad,  and  had  wept 
much  and  quietly  since  they  put  on  her  the  mourning,  and  told 
her  that  she  had  no  brother  (though  she  had  no  remembrance 
of  the  lost),  began  now  to  evince  infantine  curiosity  and  eager- 
ness to  catch  the  first  peep  of  her  father's  beloved  tower. 
And  Blanche  sat  on  my  knee,  and  I  shared  her  impatience. 
At  last  there  came  in  view  a  church  spire — a  church — a  plain 
square  building  near  it,  the  parsonage  (my  father's  old  home), 
— a  long  straggling  street  of  cottages  and  rude  shops,  with  a 
better  kind  of  house  here  and  there — and  in  the  hinder  ground, 
a  gray  deformed  mass  of  wall  and  ruin,  placed  on  one  of  those 
eminences  on  which  the  Danes  loved  to  pitch  camp  or  build 
fort,  with  one  high,  rude,  Anglo-Xorman  tower  rising  from 
the  midst.  Few  trees  were  round  it,  and  those  either  poplars 
or  firs,  save,  as  we  approached,  one  mighty  oak — integral  and 
unscathed.     The  road  now  wound  behind  the  parsonage,  and 


'J5li  i  in:   CAXTONS: 

ap  b  steep  ascent.  Such  a  road!  the  whole  parish  ought  to 
have  been  flogged  for  if  !  If  I  had  sent  up  a  road  like  that, 
even  on  a  map,  to'  Dr.  Herman,  I  should  not  have  sat  down  in 
comfort  for  a  week  to  come! 

The  fly-coach  came  to  a  full  stop. 

"  Let  us  get  out,"  cried  I,  opening  the  door,  and  springing 
to  the  ground  to  set  the  example. 

Blanche  followed,  and  my  respected,  parents  came  next. 
But  when  Mrs.  Prinmiins  was  about  to  heave  herself  into 
movement, 

"Papce!"  said  my  father.  "I  think,  Mrs.  Primmins,  you 
must  remain  in,  to  keep  the  books  steady." 

"  Lord  love  you !"  cried  Mrs.  Primmins,  aghast. 

"The  subtraction  of  such  a  mass,  or  moles  —  supple  and 
elastic  as  all  flesh  is,  and  fitting  into  the  hard  corners  of  the 
inert  matter — such  a  subtraction,  Mrs.  Primmins,  would  leave 
a  vacuum  which  no  natural  system,  certainly  no  artificial  or- 
ganization, could  sustain.  There  would  be  a  regular  dance  of 
atoms,  Mrs.  Primmins  ;  my  books  would  fly  here,  there,  on  the 
floor,  out  of  the  window ! 

'  Corporis  officium  est  quoniam  omnia  deorsum.'' 

The  business  of  a  body  like  yours,  Mrs.  Primmins,  is  to  press 
all  things  down — to  keep  them  tight,  as  you  will  know  one  of 
these  days — that  is,  if  you  will  do  me  the  favour  to  read  Lu- 
cretius, and  master  that  material  philosophy,  of  which  I  may 
say,  without  flattery,  my  dear  Mrs.  Primmins,  that  you  are  a 
living  illustration." 

These,  the  first  words  my  father  had  spoken  since  we  set 
out  from  the  inn,  seemed  to  assure  my  mother  that  she  need 
have  no  apprehension  as  to  the  character  of  his  thoughts,  for 
her  brow  cleared,  and  she  said,  laughing, 

"  Only  look  at  poor  Primmins,  and  then  at  that  hill !" 

"You  may  subtract  Primmins,  if  you  will  be  answerable  for 
the  remnant,  Kitty.  Only,  I  warn  you  that  it  is  against  all  the 
laws  of  physics." 

So  saying,  ho  sprang  lightly  forward,  and,  taking  hold  of 
my  arm,  paused  and  looked  round,  and  drew  the  loud  free 
breath  with  which  we  draw  native  air. 

u  And  yet,"  said  my  father,  after  that  grateful  and  affection- 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  253 

ate  inspiration — "  and  yet,  it  must  be  owned,  that  a  more  ugly 
country  one  cannot  see  out  of  Cambridgeshire."* 

"  Nay,"  said  I,  "  it  is  bold  and  large,  it  has  a  beauty  of  its 
own.  Those  immense,  undulating,  uncultivated,  treeless  tracts 
have  surely  their  charm  of  wildness  and  solitude !  And  how 
they  suit  the  character  of  the  ruin !  All  is  feudal  there !  I 
understand  Roland  better  now." 

"  I  hope  to  heaven  Cardan  will  come  to  no  harm !"  cried  my 
father ;  "  he  is  very  handsomely  bound ;  and  he  fitted  beauti- 
fully just  into  the  fleshiest  part  of  that  fidgety  Primmins." 

Blanche,  meanwhile,  had  run  far  before  us,  and  I  followed 
fist.  There  were  still  the  remains  of  that  deep  trench  (sur- 
rounding the  ruins  on  three  sides,  leaving  a  ragged  hill-top  at 
the  fourth)  which  made  the  favourite  fortification  of  all  the 
Teutonic  tribes.  A  causeway,  raised  on  brick  arches,  now, 
however,  supplied  the  place  of  the  drawbridge,  and  the  outer 
gate  was  but  a  mass  of  picturesque  ruin.  Entering  into  the 
courtyard  or  bailey,  the  old  castle  mound,  from  which  justice 
had  been  dispensed,  was  in  full  view,  rising  higher  than  the 
broken  walls  around  it,  and  partially  overgrown  with  bram- 
bles. And  there  stood,  comparatively  whole,  the  Tower  or 
Keep,  and  from  its  portals  emerged  the  veteran  owner. 

His  ancestors  might  have  received  us  in  more  state,  but  cer- 
tainly they  could  not  have  given  us  a  warmer  greeting.  In 
fact,  in  his  own  domain  Roland  appeared  another  man.  His 
stiffness,  which  was  a  little  repulsive  to  those  who  did  not  un- 
derstand it,  was  all  gone.  He  seemed  less  proud,  precisely  be- 
cause he  and  his  pride,  on  that  ground,  were  on  good  terms 
with  each  other.  How  gallantly  he  extended — not  his  arm,  in 
our  modern  Jack-and-Jill  sort  of  fashion — but  his  right  hand 
to  my  mother ;  how  carefully  he  led  her  over  "  brake,  bush, 
and  scaur,"  through  the  low  vaulted  door,  where  a  tall  serv- 
ant, who,  it  was  easy  to  see,  had  been  a  soldier — in  the  precise 
livery,  no  doubt,  warranted  by  the  heraldic  colours  (his  stock- 
ings were  red !) — stood  upright  as  a  sentry.  And,  coming  into 
the  hall,  it  looked  absolutely  cheerful — it  took  us  by  surprise. 
There  was  a  great  fire-place,  and,  though  it  was  still  summer, 

*  This  certainly  cannot  be  said  of  Cumberland  generally,  one  of  the  most 
beautiful  counties  in  Great  Britain.  But  the  immediate  district  to  which 
Mr.  Caxton's  exclamation  refers,  if  not  ugly,  is  at  least  savage,  bare,  and 
rude. 


THE   CAXTON8  '. 

a  great  11  :-< - !  It  did  uot  seem  a  bit  too  much,  for  the  walls 
were  Btone,  the  lofty  roof  open  to  the  rafters,  while  the  win- 
dows were  small  and  narrow,  and  so  high  and  so  deep  sunk 
that  one  Beemed  in  a  vault.  Nevertheless,  I  say  the  room 
looked  Bociable  and  cheerful — thanks  principally  to  the  fire, 
and  partly  to  a  very  ingenious  medley  of  old  tapestry  at  one 
end,  and  matting  at  the  other,  fastened  to  the  lower  part  of 
the  walls,  seconded  by  an  arrangement  of  furniture  which  did 
credit  to  my  uncle's  taste  for  the  picturesque.  After  we  had 
looked  about  and  admired  to  our  heart's  content,  Roland  took 
us — not  up  one  of  those  noble  staircases  you  see  in  the  later 
manorial  residences — but  a  little  winding  stone  stair,  into  the 
rooms  he  had  appropriated  to  his  guests.  There  was  first  a 
small  chamber,  which  he  called  my  father's  study — in  truth,  it 
would  have  done  for  any  philosopher  or  saint  who  wished  to 
shut  out  the  world — and  might  have  passed  for  the  interior  of 
such  a  column  as  the  Stylites  inhabited ;  for  you  must  have 
climbed  a  ladder  to  have  looked  out  of  the  window,  and  then 
the  vision  of  no  short-sighted  man  could  have  got  over  the  in- 
terval in  the  wall  made  by  the  narrow  casement,  which,  after 
all,  gave  no  other  prospect  than  a  Cumberland  sky,  with  an  oc- 
casional rook  in  it.  But  my  father,  I  think  I  have  said  before, 
did  not  much  care  for  scenery,  and  he  looked  round  with  great 
satisfaction  upon  the  retreat  assigned  him. 

"  We  can  knock  up  shelves  for  your  books  in  no  time,"  said 
my  uncle,  rubbing  his  hands. 

"  It  would  be  a  charity,"  quoth  my  father,  "  for  they  have 
been  very  long  in  a  recumbent  position,  and  would  like  to 
stretch  themselves,  poor  things.  My  dear  Roland,  this  room 
is  made  for  books — so  round  and  so  deep.  I  shall  sit  here  like 
Truth  in  a  well." 

"  And  there  is  a  room  for  you,  sister,  just  out  of  it,"  said  my 
uncle,  opening  a  little,  low,  prison-like  door  into  a  charming 
room,  for  its  window  was  lowr,  and  it  had  an  iron  balcony; 
"and  out  of  that  is  the  bedroom.  For  you,  Pisistratus,  my 
boy,  I  am  afraid  that  it  is  soldier's  quarters,  indeed,  with  which 
you  will  have  to  put  up.  But  never  mind ;  in  a  day  or  two 
we  sli;ill  make  all  worthy  a  general  of  your  illustrious  name — 
lor  he  was  a  great  general,  Pisistratus  the  First — was  he  not, 
brother?" 

"All  tyrants  are,"  said  my  father;  "the  knack  of  soldiering 
is  indispensable  to  them." 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  255 

"  Oh,  you  may  say  what  you  please  here,"  said  Roland,  in 
high  good-humour,  as  he  drew  me  down  stairs,  still  apologiz- 
ing for  my  quarters,  and  so  earnestly,  that  I  made  up  my  mind 
that  I  Avas  to  be  put  into  an  oubliette.  Nor  were  my  suspicions 
much  dispelled  on  seeing  that  we  had  to  leave  the  keep,  and 
pick  our  way  into  what  seemed  to  me  a  mere  heap  of  rubbish, 
on  the  dexter  side  of  the  court.  But  I  was  agreeably  surprised 
to  find,  amidst  these  wrecks,  a  room  with  a  noble  casement, 
commanding  the  whole  country,  and  placed  immediately  over 
a  plot  of  ground  cultivated  as  a  garden.  The  furniture  was 
ample,  though  homely ;  the  floors  and  walls  well  matted ;  and, 
altogether,  despite  the  inconvenience  of  having  to  cross  the 
courtyard  to  get  to  the  rest  of  the  house,  and  being  wholly 
without  the  modern  luxury  of  a  bell,  I  thought  that  I  could 
not  be  better  lodged. 

"  But  this  is  a  perfect  bower,  my  dear  uncle !  Depend  on 
it,  it  was  the  bower-chamber  of  the  Dames  de  Caxton — heaven 
rest  them !" 

"  No,"  said  my  uncle,  gravely ;  "  I  suspect  it  must  have  been 
the  chaplain's  room,  for  the  chapel  was  to  the  right  of  you. 
An  earlier  chapel,  indeed,  formerly  existed  in  the  keep  tower 
— for,  indeed,  it  is  scarcely  a  true  keep  without  a  chapel,  well, 
and  hall.  I  can  show  you  part  of  the  roof  of  the  first,  and  the 
two  last  are  entire ;  the  well  is  very  curious,  formed  in  the 
substance  of  the  wall  at  one  angle  of  the  hall.  In  Charles 
the  First's  time,  our  ancestor  lowered  his  only  son  down  in  a 
bucket,  and  kept  him  there  six  hours,  while  a  Malignant  mob 
was  storming  the  tower.  I  need  not  say  that  our  ancestor 
himself  scorned  to  hide  from  such  a  rabble,  for  he  was  a  grown 
man.  The  boy  lived  to  be  a  sad  spendthrift,  and  used  the 
well  for  cooling  his  wine.  He  drank  up  a  great  many  good 
acres." 

"  I  should  scratch  him  out  of  the  pedigree,  if  I  were  you. 
But  pray,  have  you  not  discovered  the  proper  chamber  of  that 
great  Sir  William,  about  whom  my  father  is  so  shamefully 
sceptical  ?" 

"  To  tell  you  a  secret,"  answered  the  Captain,  giving  me  a 
sly  poke  in  the  ribs,  "  I  have  put  your  father  into  it !  There 
are  the  initial  letters  W.  C.  let  into  the  cusp  of  the  York  rose, 
and  the  date,  three  years  before  the  battle  of  Bosworth,  over 
the  chimneypiece." 


THE  CAXT0NS  : 

I  could  n<>t  help  joining  my  ancle's  grim,  low  laugb  a1  this 
characteristic  pleasantry;  and  after  I  had  complimented  him 
on  bo  judicious  a  mode  of  proving  his  point,  I  asked  him  how 
he  could  possibly  have  contrived  to  fit  up  the  ruin  so  well,  es- 
pecially  as  he  had  scarcely  visited  it  since  his  purchase. 

"  Why,"  said  he,  "  some  years  ago,  that  poor  fellow  you  now 
as  my  servant,  and  who  is  gardener,  bailifl*  seneschal,  but- 
ler, and  anything  else  you  can  put  him  to,  was  sent  out  of  the 
army  on  the  invalid  list.  So  I  placed  him  here ;  and  as  he  is  a 
capital  carpenter,  and  has  had  a  very  fair  education,  I  told  him 
what  I  wanted,  and  put  by  a  small  sum  every  year  for  repairs 
and  furnishing.  It  is  astonishing  how  little  it  cost  me;  for 
Bolt,  poor  fellow  (that  is  his  name),  caught  the  right  spirit  of 
the  thing,  and  most  of  the  furniture  (which  you  see  is  ancient 
and  suitable)  he  picked  up  at  different  cottages  and  farm-houses 
in  the  neighbourhood.  As  it  is,  however,  we  have  plenty  more 
rooms  here  and  there — only,  of  late,"  continued  my  uncle, 
slightly  changing  colour,  "I  had  no  money  to  spare.  But 
come,"  he  resumed,  with  an  evident  effort — "  come  and  see  my 
barrack :  it  is  on  the  other  side  of  the  hall,  and  made  out  of 
what  no  doubt  were  the  butteries." 

"We  reached  the  yard  and  found  the  fly-coach  had  just  crawl- 
ed to  the  door.  My  father's  head  was  buried  dee})  in  the  ve- 
hicle,— he  was  gathering  up  his  packages,  and  sending  out, 
oracle-like,  various  muttered  objurgations  and  anathemas  upon 
Mrs.  Primming  and  her  vaccuum  ;  which  Mrs.  Primmins,  stand- 
ing by  and  making  a  lap  with  her  apron  to  receive  the  pack- 
ages and  anathemas  simultaneously,  bore  with  the  mildness  of 
an  angel,  lifting  up  her  eyes  to  heaven  and  murmuring  some- 
thing about  "poor  old  bones."  Though,  as  for  Mrs.  Prim- 
mins's  bones,  they  had  been  myths  these  twenty  years,  and  you 
might  as  soon  have  found  a  Plesiosaurus  in  the  fat  lands  of 
Romney  Marsh  as  a  bone  amidst  those  layers  of  flesh  in  which 
my  poor  father  thought  he  had  so  carefully  cottoned  up  his 
( iardan. 

Leaving  these  parties  to  adjust  matters  between  them,  we 
stepped  under  the  low  doorway,  and  entered  Roland's  room. 
Oh,  certainly  Holt  IkkI  caught  the  spirit  of  the  thing! — cer- 
tainly he  had  penetrated  down  to  the  pathos  that  lay  within 
the  deeps  of*  Roland's  character.  Buffon  says  "the  style  is  the 
man;"  there,  the  room  was  the  man.     That  nameless,  inex- 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  257 

pressible,  soldier-like,  methodical  neatness  which  belonged  to 
Roland — that  was  the  first  thing  that  struck  one — that  was  the 
general  character  of  the  whole.  Then,  in  details,  there,  in  stout 
oak  shelves,  were  the  books  on  which  my  father  loved  to  jest 
his  more  imaginative  brother, — there  they  were,  Froissart, 
Barante,  Joinville,  the  Mort  cV Arthur,  Amadis  of  Gaul,  Spen- 
ser's Fairy  Queen,  a  noble  copy  of  Strutt's  Horda,  Mallet's 
Northern  Antiquities,  Percy's  Reliques,  Pope's  Homer,  books 
on  gunnery,  archery,  hawking,  fortification — old  chivalry  and 
modern  war  together  cheek-by-jowl. 

Old  chivalry  and  modern  war ! — look  to  that  tilting  helmet 
with  the  tall  Caxton  crest,  and  look  to  that  trophy  near  it,  a 
French  cuirass — and  that  old  banner  (a  knight's  pennon)  sur- 
mounting those  crossed  bayonets.  And  over  the  chimney-piece 
there — bright,  clean,  and,  I  warrant  you,  dusted  daily — are  Ro- 
land's own  sword,  his  holsters  and  pistols,  yea,  the  saddle, 
pierced  and  lacerated,  from  which  he  had  reeled  when  that  leg 
— I  gasped — I  felt  it  all  at  a  glance,  and  I  stole  softly  to  the 
spot,  and,  had  Roland  not  been  there,  I  could  have  kissed  that 
sword  as  reverently  as  if  it  had  .been  a  Bayard's  or  a  Sidney's. 
'  My  uncle  was  too  modest  to  guess  my  emotion ;  he  rather 
thought  I  had  turned  my  face  to  conceal  a  smile  at  his  vanity, 
and  said,  in  a  deprecating  tone  of  apology — "  It  was  all  Bolt's 
doine:,  foolish  fellow." 


CHAPTER  IV. 

Our  host  regaled  us  with  a  hospitality  that  notably  contrast- 
ed his  economical  thrifty  habits  in  London.  To  be  sure,  Bolt 
had  caught  the  great  pike  which  headed  the  feast ;  and  Bolt, 
no  doubt,  had  helped  to  rear  those  fine  chickens  ab  ovo :  Bolt, 
I  have  no  doubt,  made  that  excellent  Spanish  omelette ;  and, 
for  the  rest,  the  products  of  the  sheepwalk  and  the  garden 
came  in  as  volunteer  auxiliaries — very  different  from  the  mer- 
cenary recruits  by  which  those  metropolitan  Condottieri,  the 
butcher  and  greengrocer,  hasten  the  ruin  of  that  melancholy 
commonwealth,  called  "  genteel  poverty." 

Our  evening  passed  cheerfully ;  and  Roland,  contrary  to  his 
custom,  was  talker  in  chief.  It  was  eleven  o'clock  before  Bolt 
appeared  with  a  lantern  to  conduct  me  through  the  courtyard 


258  THE   CAZTONS  '. 

to  my  dormitory  among  the  ruins — a  ceremony  which,  every 
night,  shine  or  dark, he  insisted  upon  punctiliously  performing. 
h  was  long  before  I  could  sleep — before  1  could  believe  that 
but  so  few  days  had  elapsed  since  Roland  heard  of  his  son's 
!i — thai  son  whose  fate  had  so  long  tortured  him;  and  yet 
m  ver  had  Roland  appeared  so  free  from  sorrow!  Was  it  nat- 
ural— was  it  effort  ?  Several  days  passed  before  I  could  an- 
swer that  question,  and  then  not  wholly  to  my  satisfaction. 
Effort  there  was,  or  rather  resolute,  systematic  determination. 
At  moments  Roland's  head  drooped,  his  brows  met,  and  the 
whole  man  seemed  to  sink.  Yet  these  were  only  moments ;  he 
would  rouse  himself  up,  like  a  dozing  charger  at  the  sound  of 
a  trumpet,  and  shake  off  the  creeping  weight.  But  whether 
from  the  vigour  of  his  determination,  or  from  some  aid  in  oth- 
er trains  of  reflection,  I  could  not  but  perceive  that  Roland's 
sadness  really  was  less  grave  and  bitter  than  it  had  been,  or 
than  it  was  natural  to  suppose.  He  seemed  to  transfer,  daily, 
more  and  more,  his  affections  from  the  dead  to  those  around 
him,  especially  to  Blanche  and  myself.  He  let  it  be  seen  that 
he  looked  on  me  now  as  his  lawful  successor — as  the  future 
supporter  of  his  name  :  he  was  fond  of  confiding  to  me  all  his 
little  plans,  and  consulting  me  on  them.  He  would  walk  with 
me  around  his  domains  (of  which  I  shall  say  more  hereafter) 
— point  out,  from  every  eminence  we  climbed,  where  the  broad 
lands  which  his  forefathers  had  owned  stretched  away  to  the 
horizon ;  unfold  with  tender  hand  the  mouldering  pedigree, 
and  rest  lingeringly  on  those  of  his  ancestors  who  had  held 
martial  post,  or  had  died  on  the  field.  There  was  a  crusader 
who  had  followed  Richard  to  Ascalon  ;  there  was  a  knight 
who  had  fought  at  Agincourt ;  there  was  a  cavalier  (whose 
picture  was  still  extant),  with  fair  love-locks,  who  had  fallen  at 
Worcester— no  doubt  the  same  who  had  cooled  his  son  in  that 
w"]l  which  the  son  devoted  to  more  agreeable  associations. 
But  of  all  these  worthies  there  was  none  whom  my  uncle,  per- 
haps from  the  spirit  of  contradiction,  valued  like  that  apocry- 
phal Sir  William  :  and  why?  because  when  the  apostate  Stan- 
ley turned  the  fortunes  oft  he  field  at  Bosworth,  and  when  that 
cry  of  despair, — "Treason  !  treason  !"  burst  from  the  lips  of 
thelasi  Plantagenet, " amongst  the  faithless,"  this  true  soldier, 
"faithful  found!"  had  fallen  in  that  lion  rush  which  Richard 
made  at  his  foe.     "Your  father  tells  me  that  Richard  was  a 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  259 

murderer  and  usurper,"  quoth  my  uncle.  "  Sir,  that  might  be 
true  or  not ;  but  it  was  not  on  the  field  of  battle  that  his  fol- 
lowers were  to  reason  on  the  character  of  the  master  who  trust- 
ed them,  especially  when  a  legion  of  foreign  hirelings  stood  op- 
posed to  them.  I  would  not  have  descended  from  that  turn- 
coat Stanley  to  be  lord  of  all  the  lands  the  earls  of  Derby  can 
boast  of.  Sir,  in  loyalty,  men  fight  and  die  for  a  grand  prin- 
ciple and  a  lofty  passion  ;  and  this  brave  Sir  William  was  pay- 
ing back  to  the  last  Plantagenet  the  benefits  he  had  received 
from  the  first !" 

"  And  yet  it  may  be  doubted,"  said  I,  maliciously,  "  whether 
William  Caxton  the  printer  did  not — " 

"  Plague,  pestilence,  and  fire  seize  William  Caxton  the  print- 
er, and  his  invention  too  !"  cried  my  uncle,  barbarously. 
"  When  there  were  only  a  few  books,  at  least  they  were  good 
ones  ;  and  now  they  are  so  plentiful,  all  they  do  is  to  confound 
the  judgment,  unsettle  the  reason,  drive  the  good  books  out 
of  cultivation,  and  draw  a  ploughshare  of  innovation  over  ev- 
ery ancient  landmark ;  seduce  the  women,  womanize  the  men, 
upset  states,  thrones,  and  churches  ;  rear  a  race  of  chattering, 
conceited  coxcombs,  who  can  always  find  books  in  plenty  to 
excuse  them  from  doing  their  duty ;  make  the  poor  discontent- 
ed, the  rich  crotchety  and  whimsical,  refine  away  the  stout  old 
virtues  into  quibbles  and  sentiments !  All  imagination  former- 
ly was  expended  in  noble  action,  adventure,  enterprise,  high 
deeds,  and  aspirations !  now  a  man  can  but  be  imaginative  by 
feeding  on  the  false  excitement  of  passions  he  never  felt,  dan- 
gers he  never  shared ;  and  he  fritters  away  all  there  is  of  life 
to  spare  in  him  upon  the  fictitious  love-sorrows  of  Bond  Street 
and  St.  James's.  Sir,  chivalry  ceased  when  the  press  rose ! 
and  to  fasten  upon  me,  as  a  forefather,  out  of  all  men  who  ever 
lived  and  sinned,  the  very  man  who  has  most  destroyed  what 
I  most  valued — who,  by  the  Lord !  with  his  cursed  invention 
has  well-nigh  got  rid  of  respect  for  forefathers  altogether — is 
a  cruelty  of  which  my  brother  had  never  been  capable,  if  that 
printer's  devil  had  not  got  hold  of  him  !" 

That  a  man  in  this  blessed  nineteenth  century  should  be 
such  a  Vandal !  and  that  my  Uncle  Roland  should  talk  in  a 
strain  that  Totila  would  have  been  ashamed  of,  within  so  short 
a  time  after  my  father's  scientific  and  erudite  oration  on  the 
Hygeiana  of  Books,  was  enough  to  make  one  despair  of  the 


200  THE  (  axto.xs: 

progress  of  intellect  and  the  perfectibility  of  our  species.  And 
I  have  ii'»  manner  of  doubt  that,  all  the  while,  my  uncle  had  a 
brace  of  books  in  his  pockets,  Robert  Hall  one  oftheml     In 

truth,  lie  had  talked  himself  into  a  passion,  and  did  not  know 
what  nonsense  he  was  Baying.  But  this  explosion  of  Captain 
Roland's  has  shattered  the  thread  of  my  matter.  Pouff!  I  must 
take  breath  and  begin  again! 

Yes,  in  spite  of  my  saueiness,  the  old  soldier  evidently  took 
t<>  me  more  and  more.  And,  besides  our  critical  examination 
of  the  property  and  the  pedigree,  he  carried  me  with  him  on 
long  excursions  to  distant  villages,  where  some  memorial  of  a 
defunct  Caxton,  a  coat  of  arms,  or  an  epitaph  on  a  tombstone, 
might  be  still  seen.  And  he  made  me  pore  over  topograph- 
ical works  and  county  histories  (forgetful,  Goth  that  he  was, 
that  for  those  very  authorities  he  was  indebted  to  the  repudia- 
ted printer!)  to  find  some  anecdote  of  his  beloved  dead!  In 
truth,  the  country  for  miles  round  bore  the  vestigia  of  those 
old  Caxtons ;  their  handwriting  was  on  many  a  broken  wall. 
And,  obscure  as  they  all  were,  compared  to  that  great  oper- 
ative of  the  Sanctuary  at  Westminster,  whom  my  father  clung 
to  —  still,  that  the  yesterdays  that  had  lighted  them  the  way 
to  dusty  death  had  cast  no  glare  on  dishonoured  scutcheons 
seemed  clear,  from  the  popular  respect  and  traditional  affection 
in  which  I  found  that  the  name  was  still  held  in  hamlet  and 
homestead.  It  was  pleasant  to  see  the  veneration  with  which 
this  small  hidalgo  of  some  three  hundred  a-year  was  held,  and 
the  patriarchal  affection  with  which  he  returned  it.  Roland 
was  a  man  who  would  walk  into  a  cottage,  rest  his  cork  leor  on 
the  hearth,  and  talk  for  the  hour  together  upon  all  that  lay 
nearest  to  the  hearts  of  the  owners.  There  is  a  peculiar  spirit 
of  aristocracy  amongst  agricultural  peasants :  they  like  old 
names  and  families ;  they  identify  themselves  with  the  honours 
of  a  house,  as  if  of  its  clan.  They  do  not  care  so  much  for 
wealth  as  townsfolk  and  the  middle  class  do  ;  they  have  a  pity, 
1-ut  a  respectful  one,  for  well-born  poverty.  And  then  this 
Roland, too — who  would  go  and  dine  in  a  cook-shop,  and  re- 
ceive change  for  a  shilling,  and  shun  the  ruinous  luxury  of  a 
cabriolet — could  be  positively  extravagant  in  his  liberalities  to 
those  around  him.  lb'  was  altogether  another  being  in  his 
paternal  acres.  The  shabby-genteel,  half-pay  captain,  lost  in 
the  whirl  of  London,  here  luxuriated  into  a  dignified  ease  of 


A    FAMILY    PICT  LEE.  261 

manner  that  Chesterfield  might  have  admired.  And  if  to 
please  is  the  true  sign  of  politeness,  I  wish  you  could  have 
seen  the  faces  that  smiled  upon  Captain  Roland,  as  he  walked 
down  the  village,  nodding  from  side  to  side. 

One  day  a  frank,  hearty  old  woman,  who  had  known  Ro- 
land as  a  boy,  seeing  him  lean  on  my  arm,  stopped  us,  as  she 
said  bluffly,  to  take  a  "  geud  luik"  at  me. 

Fortunately  I  was  stalwart  enough  to  pass  muster,  even  in 
the  eyes  of  a  Cumberland  matron ;  and  after  a  compliment  at 
which  Roland  seemed  much  pleased,  she  said  to  me,  but  point- 
ing to  the  Captain — 

"  Hegh,  sir,  now  you  ha  the  bra  time  before  you ;  you  maun 
een  try  an  be  as  geud  as  he.  And  if  life  last,  ye  wull  too — for 
there  never  waur  a  bad  ane  of  that  stock.  Wi'  heads  kindly 
stup'd  to  the  least,  and  lifted  manfu'  oop  to  the  heighest — that 
ye  all  war'  sin  ye  came  from  the  Ark.  Blessins  on  the  ould 
name — though  little  pelf  goes  with  it,  it  sounds  on  the  peur 
man's  ear  like  a  bit  of  gould  !" 

"Do  you  not  see  now,"  said  Roland,  as  we  turned  away, 
"  what  we  owe  to  a  name,  and  what  to  our  forefathers  ? — do 
you  not  see  why  the  remotest  ancestor  has  a  right  to  our  re- 
spect and  consideration — for  he  was  a  parent  ?  '  Honour  your 
parents' — the  law  does  not  say,  '  Honour  your  children.'  If  a 
child  disgrace  us,  and  the  dead,  and  the  sanctity  of  this  great 
heritage  of  their  virtues — the  name; — if  he  does — "  Roland 
stopped  short,  and  added  fervently,  "  But  you  are  my  heir 
now — I  have  no  fear !  What  matter  one  foolish  old  man's 
sorrows  ? — the  name,  that  property  of  generations,  is  saved, 
thank  Heaven — the  name  !" 

Now  the  riddle  was  solved,  and  I  understood  why,  amidst 
all  his  natural  grief  for  a  son's  loss,  that  proud  father  was  con- 
soled. For  he  was  less  himself  a  father  than  a  son — son  to  the 
long  dead.  From  every  grave  where  a  progenitor  slept,  he  had 
heard  a  parent's  voice.  He  could  bear  to  be  bereaved,  if  the 
forefathers  were  not  dishonoured.  Roland  was  more  than  half 
a  Roman — the  son  might  still  cling  to  his  household  affections, 
but  the  lares  were  a  part  of  his  religion. 


262  THE   CAXTOXS 


CHAPTER  V. 

But  I  ought  to  be  hard  at  work,  preparing  myself  for  Cam- 
bridge.  The  deuce! — how  can  I?  The  point  in  academical 
education  on  which  I  require  most  preparation  is  Greek  com- 
position. I  come  to  my  father,  who,  one  might  think,  was  at 
home  enough  in  this.  But  rare  indeed  is  it  to  find  a  great 
scholar  who  is  a  good  teacher. 

My  dear  lather !  if  one  is  content  to  take  you  in  your  own 
way,  there  never  was  a  more  admirable  instructor  for  the 
heart,  the  head,  the  principles,  or  the  taste — when  you  have 
discovered  that  there  is  some  one  sore  to  be  healed — one  de- 
fect to  be  repaired  :  and  you  have  rubbed  your  spectacles,  and 
got  your  hand  fairly  into  that  recess  between  your  frill  and 
your  waistcoat.  But  to  go  to  you,  cut  and  dry,  monotonously, 
regularly — book  and  exercise  in  hand — to  see  the  mournful  pa- 
tience with  which  you  tear  yourself  from  that  great  volume  of 
Cardan  in  the  very  honeymoon  of  possession — and  then  to  note 
those  mild  eyebrows  gradually  distend  themselves  into  per- 
plexed diagonals  over  some  false  quantity  or  some  barbarous 
collocation — till  there  steal  forth  that  horrible  "  Papoe  !"  which 
means  more  on  your  lips  than  I  am  sure  it  ever  did  when  Latin 
was  a  live  language,  and  "  Papae  !"  a  natural  and  unpedantic 
ejaculation  ! — no,  I  would  sooner  blunder  through  the  dark  by 
myself  a  thousand  times  than  light  my  rushlight  at  the  lamp 
of  that  Phlegethonian  "Papa3 !" 

And  then  my  father  would  wisely  and  kindly,  but  wondrous 
slowly,  erase  three-fourths  of  one's  pet  verses,  and  intercalate 
others  that  one  saw  were  exquisite,  but  could  not  exactly  see 
why.  And  then  one  asked  why;  and  my  father  shook  his 
head  in  despair,  and  said — "But  you  ought  to  fed  why !" 

In  short,  scholarship  to  him  was  like  poetry:  he  could  no 
more  teach  it  to  you  than  Pindar  could  have  taught  you  how 
lo  make  an  ode.  You  breathed  the  aroma,  but  you  could  no 
more  seize  and  analyze  it,  than,  with  the  opening  of  your  naked 
hand,  yon  could  carry  off  the  scent  of  a  rose.  I  soon  left  my 
lather  in  peace  to  Cardan,  and  to  the  Great  Book,  which  last, 


A    FAMILY    PICTUKE.  263 

by  the  way,  advanced  but  slowly.  For  Uncle  Jack  had  now 
insisted  on  its  being  published  in  quarto,  with  illustrative 
plates ;  and  those  plates  took  an  immense  time,  and  were  to 
cost  an  immense  sum — but  that  cost  Avas  the  affair  of  the  Anti- 
Publisher  Society.  But  how  can  I  settle  to  work  by  myself? 
No  sooner  have  I  got  into  my  room — penitus  ah  orbe  divisus, 
as  I  rashly  think — than  there  is  a  tap  at  the  door.  Now  it  is 
my  mother,  who  is  benevolently  engaged  upon  making  curtains 
to  all  the  windows  (a  trifling  superfluity  that  Bolt  had  forgot- 
ten or  disdained),  and  who  wants  to  know  how  the  draperies 
are  fashioned  at  Mr.  Trevanion's  :  a  pretence  to  have  me  near 
her,  and  see  with  her  own  eyes  that  I  am  not  fretting ;  the 
moment  she  hears  I  have  shut  myself  up  in  my  room,  she  is 
sure  that  it  is  for  sorrow.  Now  it  is  Bolt,  who  is  making 
book-shelves  for  my  father,  and  desires  to  consult  me  at  every 
turn,  especially  as  I  have  given  him  a  Gothic  design,  which 
pleases  him  hugely.  Now  it  is  Blanche,  whom,  in  an  evil 
hour,  I  undertook  to  teach  to  draw,  and  who  comes  in  on  tip- 
toe, vowing  she'll  not  disturb  me,  and  sits  so  quiet  that  she 
fidgets  me  out  of  all  patience.  Now,  and  much  more  often,  it 
is  the  Captain,  who  wants  me  to  walk,  to  ride,  to.  fish.  And, 
by  St.  Hubert !  (saint  of  the  chase)  bright  August  comes — and 
there  is  moor-game  on  those  barren  wolds — and  my  uncle  has 
given  me  the  gun  he  shot  with  at  my  age — single-barrelled, 
flint  lock — but  you  would  not  have  laughed  at  it  if  you  had 
seen  the  strange  feats  it  did  in  Roland's  hands — while  in  mine, 
I  could  always  lay  the  blame  on  the  flint  lock  !  Time,  in  short, 
passed  rapidly  ;  and  if  Roland  and  I  had  our  dark  hours,  we 
chased  them  away  before  they  could  settle — shot  them  on  the 
wing  as  they  got  up. 

Then,  too,  though  the  immediate  scenery  around  my  uncle's 
was  so  bleak  and  desolate,  the  country  within  a  few  miles  was 
so  full  of  objects  of  interest — of  landscapes  so  poetically  grand 
or  lovely ;  and  occasionally  we  coaxed  my  father  from  the  Car- 
dan, and  spent  whole  days  by  the  margin  of  some  glorious 
lake. 

Amongst  these  excursions,  I  made  one  by  myself  to  that 
house  in  which  my  father  had  known  the  bliss  and  the  pangs 
of  that  stern  first-love  which  still  left  its  scars  fresh  on  my  own 
memory.  The  house,  large  and  imposing,  was  shut  up — the 
Trevanions  had  not  been  there  for  years — the  pleasure-grounds 


26  \  i  in.  <  a \ ions: 

had  been  contracted  into  the  Bmallesl  possible  space.  There 
was  no  positive  decay  or  ruin — that  Trevanion  would  never 
have  allowed;  bu1  there  was  the  dreary  look  of  absenteeship 
everywhere.  1  penetrated  into  the  house  with  the  help  of  my 
card  and  half-a-crown.  1  saw  that  memorable  boudoir — I  could 
fancy  the  very  spot  in  which  my  father  had  heard  the  sentence 
thai  had  changed  the  current  of  his  life.  And  when  I  return- 
ed home,  I  looked  with  new  tenderness  on  my  father's  placid 
brow — and  blessed  anew  that  tender  helpmate,  who,  in  her  pa- 
tient love,  had  chased  from  it  every  shadow. 

I  had  received  one  letter  from  Vivian  a  few  days  after  our 
arrival.  It  had  been  re-directed  from  my  father's  house,  at 
which  I  had  given  him  my  address.  It  was  short,  but  seemed 
cheerful.  lie  said  that  he  believed  he  had  at  last  hit  on  the 
right  way,  and  should  keep  to  it — that  he  and  the  world  were 
better  friends  than  they  had  been — that  the  only  way  to  keep 
friends  with  the  world  was  to  treat  it  as  a  tamed  tiger,  and 
have  one  hand  on  a  crowbar  while  one  fondled  the  beast  with 
the  other.  He  enclosed  me  a  bank-note,  which  somewhat  more 
than  covered  his  debt  to  me,  and  bade  me  pay  him  the  surplus 
when  he  should,  claim  it  as  a  millionaire.  He  gave  me  no  ad- 
dress in  his  letter,  but  it  bore  the  post-mark  of  Godalming.  I 
had  the  impertinent  curiosity  to  look  into  an  old  topographical 
work  upon  Surrey,  and  in  a  supplemental  itinerary  I  found  this 
passage :  "To  the  left  of  the  beech-wood,  three  miles  from  Go- 
dalming, you  catch  a  glimpse  of  the  elegant  seat  of  Francis 
Vivian,  Esq."  To  judge  by  the  date  of  the  work,  the  said 
Francis  Vivian  might  be  the  grandfather  of  my  friend,  his 
namesake.  There  could  no  longer  be  any  doubt  as  to  the  par- 
entage of  this  prodigal  son. 

The  long  vacation  was  now  nearly  over,  and  all  his  guests 
were  1<>  Leave  the  poor  Captain.  In  fact,  we  had  made  a  con- 
siderable trespass  on  his  hospitality.  It  was  settled  that  I  was 
to  accompany  my  father  and  mother  to  their  long-neglected 
j»  nates,  and  start  thence  for  Cambridge. 

Our  parting  was  sorrowful — even  Mrs.  Primmins  wept  as 
she  -hook  hands  with  Bolt.  But  Bolt,  an  old  soldier,  was  of 
(•oiii-c  a  lady's  man.  The  brothers  did  not  shake  hands  only 
— they  fondly  embraced,  as  brothers  of  that  time  of  life  rarely 
do  nowadays,  except  on  the  stage.  And  Blanche,  with  one 
round  my  mother1  round  mine,  subbed  hi 


A    FAMILY    PICTUEE.  265 

my  ear, — "  But  I  will  be  your  little  wife,  I  will."  Finally,  the 
fly-coach  once  more  received  us  all — all  but  poor  Blanche,  and 
we  looked  round  and  missed  her. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

Alma  Matee !  Alma  Mater !  New-fashioned  folks,  with  their 
large  theories  of  education,  may  find  fault  with  thee.  But  a 
true  Spartan  mother  thou  art — hard  and  stern  as  the  old  matron 
who  bricked  up  her  son  Pausanias,  bringing  the  first  stone  to 
immure  him ;  hard  and  stern,  I  say,  to  the  worthless,  but  full 
of  majestic  tenderness  to  the  worthy. 

For  a  young  man  to  go  up  to  Cambridge  (I  say  nothing  of 
Oxford,  knowing  nothing  thereof)  merely  as  routine  work,  to 
lounge  through  three  years  to  a  degree  among  the  ol  7roX\oi — 
for  such  an  one,  Oxford  Street  herself,  whom  the  immortal  Opi- 
um-Eater hath  so  direly  apostrophized,  is  not  a  more  careless 
and  stony-hearted  mother.  But  for  him  who  will  read,  who 
will  work,  who  will  seize  the  rare  advantages  proffered,  who 
will  select  his  friends  judiciously — yea,  out  of  that  vast  ferment 
of  young  idea  in  its  lusty  vigour,  choose  the  good  and  reject 
the  bad — there  is  plenty  to  make  those  three  years  rich  with 
fruit  imperishable — three  years  nobly  spent,  even  though  one 
must  pass  over  the  Ass's  Bridge  to  get  into  the  Temple  of 
Honour. 

Important  changes  in  the  Academical  system  have  been  re- 
cently announced,  and  honours  are  henceforth  to  be  accorded 
to  the  successful  disciples  in  moral  and  natural  sciences.  By 
the  side  of  the  old  throne  of  Mathesis,  they  have  placed  two 
very  useful  fauteuils  a  la  Voltaire.  I  have  no  objection  ;  but, 
in  those  three  years  of  life,  it  is  not  so  much  the  thing  learned, 
as  the  steady  perseverance  in  learning  something  that  is  ex- 
cellent. 

It  was  fortunate,  in  one  respect,  for  me  that  I  had  seen  a 
little  of  the  real  world — the  metropolitan — before  I  came  to 
that  mimic  one,  the  cloistral.  For  what  were  called  pleasures 
in  the  last,  and  which  might  have  allured  me,  had  I  come  fresh 
from  school,  had  no  charm  for  me  now.  Hard  drinking  and 
high  play,  a  certain  mixture  of  coarseness  and  extravagance, 
made  the  fashion  among  the  idle  when  I  was  at  the  university, 

M 


266  i  m:  I  w  i<»\s  : 

eonauk  Ptanco — when  Wordsworth  was  master  of  Trinity :  it 
may  be  altered  now. 

Bui  I  had  already  outlived  such  temptations,  and  so,  natu- 
rally, I  was  thrown  out  of  the  society  of  the  idle,  and  some- 
what into  that  of  the  laborious. 

Still,  to  speak  frankly,  I  had  no  longer  the  old  pleasure  in 
books.  If  my  acquaintance  with  the  great  world  had  destroy- 
ed the  temptation  to  puerile  excesses,  it  had  also  increased  my 
constitutional  tendency  to  practical  action.  And  alas!  in  spite 
of  all  the  benefit  I  had  derived  from  Robert  Hall,  there  were 
times  when  memory  was  so  poignant  that  I  had  no  choice  but 
to  rush  from  the  lonely  room  haunted  by  tempting  phantoms 
too  dangerously  fair,  and  sober  down  the  fever  of  the  heart  by 
some  violent  bodily  fatigue.  The  ardour  which  belongs  to 
early  youth,  and  which  it  best  dedicates  to  knowledge,  had 
been  charmed  prematurely  to  shrines  less  severely  sacred. 
Therefore,  though  I  laboured,  it  was  with  that  full  sense  of 
labour  which  (as  I  found  at  a  much  later  period  of  life)  the 
truly  triumphant  student  never  knows.  Learning — that  mar- 
ble image — warms  into  life,  not  at  the  toil  of  the  chisel,  but 
the  worship  of  the  sculptor.  The  mechanical  workman  finds 
but  the  voiceless  stone. 

At  my  uncle's,  such  a  thing  as  a  newspaper  rarely  made  its 
appearance.  At  Cambridge,  even  among  reading  men,  the 
newspapers  had  their  due  importance.  Politics  ran  high,  and 
I  had  not  been  three  days  at  Cambridge  before  I  heard  Tre- 
van ion's  name.  Newspapers,  therefore,  had  their  charms  for 
inc.  Trevanion's  prophecy  about  himself  seemed  about  to  be 
fulfilled.  There  were  rumours  of  changes  in  the  Cabinet. 
Trevanion's  name  was  bandied  to  and  fro,  struck  from  praise 
to  blame,  high  and  low,  as  a  shuttlecock.  Still  the  changes 
were  not  made,  and  the  Cabinet  held  firm.  Not  a  word  in 
the  Morning  Post,  under  the  head  of  Fashionable  Intelligence, 
as  to  rumours  that  would  have  agitated  me  more  than  the  rise 
and  fall  of  governments — no  hint  of  "  the  speedy  nuptials  of 
the  daughter  and  sole  heiress  of  a  distinguished  and  wealthy 
commoner:"  only  now  and  then,  in  enumerating  the  circle  of 
brilliant  guests  at  the  house  of  some  party  chief,  I  gulped  b:iek 
the  heart  that  rushed  to  my  lips,  when  I  saw  the  names  of 
Lady  Ellinor  and  .Miss  Trevanion. 

But  amongst  all  that  prolific  progeny  of  the  periodical  press 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  267 

— remote  offspring  of  my  great  namesake  and  ancestor  (for  I 
hold  the  faith  of  my  father) — where  was  the  Literary  Times  ? 
— what  had  so  long  retarded  its  promised  blossoms  ?  Xot  a 
leaf  in  the  shape  of  advertisements  had  yet  emerged  from  its 
mother  earth.  I  hoped  from  my  heart  that  the  whole  thing 
was  abandoned,  and  would  not  mention  it  in  my  letters  home, 
lest  I  should  revive  the  mere  idea  of  it.  But,  in  default  of 
the  Literary  Times,  there  did  appear  a  new  journal,  a  daily 
journal,  too,  a  tall,  slender,  and  meagre  stripling,  with  a  vast 
head,  by  way  of  prospectus,  which  protruded  itself  for  three 
weeks  successively  at  the  top  of  the  leading  article ; — with  a 
fine  and  subtle  body  of  paragraphs ; — and  the  smallest  legs,  in 
the  way  of  advertisements,  that  any  poor  newspaper  ever 
stood  upon !  And  yet  this  attenuated  journal  had  a  plump 
and  plethoric  title,  a  title  that  smacked  of  turtle  and  venison ; 
an  aldermanic,  grandiose,  Falstaffian  title — it  was  called  The 
Capitalist.  And  all  those  fine  subtle  paragraphs  were  larded 
out  with  recipes  how  to  make  money.  There  was  an  El 
Dorado  in  every  sentence.  To  believe  that  Paper,  you  would 
think  no  man  had  ever  yet  found  a  proper  return  for  his 
pounds,  shillings,  and  pence.  You  would  turn  up  your  nose 
at  twenty  per  cent.  There  was  a  great  deal  about  Ireland — 
not  her  wrongs,  thank  Heaven !  but  her  fisheries :  a  long  in- 
quiry what  had  become  of  the  pearls  for  which  Britain  was 
once  so  famous :  a  learned  disquisition  upon  certain  lost  gold- 
mines now  happily  re-discovered  ;  a  very  ingenious  proposition 
to  turn  London  smoke  into  manure,  by  a  new  chemical  j)roc- 
ess :  recommendations*  to  the  poor  to  hatch  chickens  in  ovens 
like  the  ancient  Egyptians :  agricultural  schemes  for  sowing 
the  waste  lands  in  England  with  onions,  upon  the  system 
adopted  near  Bedford — net  produce  one  hundred  pounds  an 
acre.  In  short,  according  to  that  paper,  every  rood  of  ground 
might  well  maintain  its  man,  and  every  shilling  be  like  Hob- 
son's  money-bag,  "the  fruitful  parent  of  a  hundred  more." 
For  three  days,  at  the  newspaper  room  of  the  Union  Club, 
men  talked  of  this  journal ;  some  pished,  some  sneered,  some 
wondered:  till  an  ill-natured  mathematician,  who  had  just 
taken  his  degree,  and  had  spare  time  on  his  hands,  sent  a 
long  letter  to  the  Morning  Chronicle  showing  up  more  blun- 
ders, in  some  article  to  which  the  editor  of  The  Capitalist  had 
specially  invited  attention,  than  would  have  paved  the  whole 


268  in  I     I  Wlo.NS. 

islmi.l  of  Laputa.  After  that  time,  not  a  soul  read  Tin  Capi- 
talist. II<>\\  long  it  dragged  on  its  existence  I  know  not; 
but  it  certainly  did  not  die  of  a  maladu  <l<  langueur. 

Little  thought  I,  when  I  joined  in  the  laugh  against  The 
( Capitalists  that  I  ought  rather  to  have  followed  it  to  its  grave, 
in  black  crape  and  weepers, — unfeeling  wretch  that  I  was! 
But,  like  a  poet,  O  Capitalist!  thou  wert  not  discovered,  and 
appreciated,  and  prized,  and  mourned,  till  thou  wert  dead  and 
buried,  and  the  bill  came  in  for  thy  monument ! 

The  first  term  of  my  college  life  was  just  expiring,  when  I 
received  a  letter  from  my  mother  so  agitated,  so  alarming — at 
first  reading  so  unintelligible — that  I  could  only  see  that  some 
great  misfortune  had  befallen  us ;  and  I  stopped  short  and 
dropped  on  my  knees  to  pray  for  the  life  and  health  of  those 
whom  that  misfortune  more  specially  seemed  to  menace ;  and 
then — and  then,  towards  the  end  of  the  last  blurred  sentence, 
read  twice,  thrice  over — I  could  cry,  "  Thank  Heaven,  thank 
Heaven !  it  is  only,  then,  money  after  all !" 


PART  ELEVENTH. 

CHAPTER  I. 

The  next  day,  on  the  outside  of  the  Cambridge  Telegraph, 
there  was  one  passenger  who  ought  to  have  impressed  his  fel- 
low-travellers with  a  very  respectful  idea  of  his  lore  in  the  dead 
languages  ;  for  not  a  single  syllable,  in  a  live  one,  did  he  vouch- 
safe to  utter  from  the  moment  he  ascended  that "  bad  eminence," 
to  the  moment  in  which  he  regained  his  mother  earth.  "  Sleep," 
says  honest  Sancho,  "  covers  a  man  better  than  a  cloak."  I 
am  ashamed  of  thee,  honest  Sancho !  thou  art  a  sad  plagiarist ; 
for  Tibullus  said  pretty  nearly  the  same  thing  before  thee, — 
"Te  somnus  fusco  vclavit  amictu.v* 

But  is  not  silence  as  good  a  cloak  as  sleep  ? — does  it  not 
wrap  a  man  round  with  as  offusc  and  impervious  a  fold  ?  Si- 
lence— what  a  world  it  covers! — what  busy  schemes — what 
bright  hopes  and  dark  fears — what  ambition,  or  what  despair ! 
Do  you.  ever  see  a  man  in  any  society  sitting  mute  for  hours, 
and  not  feel  an  uneasy  curiosity  to  penetrate  the  wall  he  thus 
builds  up  between  others  and  himself?  Does  he  not  interest 
you  far  more  than  the  brilliant  talker  at  your  left — the  airy 
wit  at  your  right,  whose  shafts  fall  in  vain  on  the  sullen  barrier 
of  the  silent  man !  Silence,  dark  sister  of  Nox  and  Erebus, 
how,  layer  upon  layer,  shadow  upon  shadow,  blackness  upon 
blackness,  thou  stretchest  thyself  from  hell  to  heaven,  over  thy 
two  chosen  haunts — man's  heart  and  the  grave ! 

So,  then,  wrapped  in  my  greatcoat  and  my  silence,  I  per- 
formed my  journey ;  and  on  the  evening  of  the  second  day  I 
reached  the  old-fashioned  brick  house.  How  shrill  on  my  ears 
sounded  the  bell !  How  strange  and  ominous  to  my  impatience 
seemed  the  light  gleaming  across  the  windows  of  the  hall ! 
How  my  heart  beat  as  I  watched  the  servant  who  opened  the 
gate  to  my  summons ! 

"All  well?"  cried  I. 

"  All  well,  sir,"  answered  the   servant   cheerfully.     "  Mr. 
*  Tibullus,  iii.  4,  55. 


270  THE   CAXTONS: 

Squills,  indeed,  is  with  master,  but  I  don't  think  there  is  any- 
thin--  the  matter." 

Bui  now  my  mother  appeared  at  the  threshold,  and  I  was  in 
her  arms. 

"Sisty,  Sisty! — my  dear,  dear  son! — beggared,  perhaps — 
and  my  fault — mine." 

"Yours  ! — come  into  this  room,  out  of  hearing — your  fault?" 

"  5Tes — yes! — for  if  I  had  had  no  brother,  or  if  I  had  not 
been  led  away, — if  I  had,  as  I  ought,  entreated  poor  Austin 
not  to" — 

"My  dear,  dearest  mother,  you  accuse  yourself  for  what, 
ii  seems,  was  my  uncle's  misfortune — I  am  sure  not  even  his 
fault!  (I  made  a  gulp  there.)  No,  lay  the  fault  on  the  right 
shoulders — the  defunct  shoulders  of  that  horrible  progenitor, 
William  Caxton,  the  printer,  for,  though  I  don't  yet  know  the 
particulars  of  what  has  happened,  I  will  lay  a  wager  it  is  con- 
nected With  that  fatal  invention  of  printing.  Come,  come — 
my  father  is  well,  is  he  not?" 

-  Yes,  thank  Heaven." 

"  And  I  too,  and  Roland,  and  little  Blanche !  Why,  then, 
you  are  right  to  thank  Heaven,  for  your  true  treasures  are 
untouched.     But  sit  down  and  explain,  pray." 

"I  cannot  explain.  I  do  not  understand  anything  more 
than  that  he,  my  brother, — mine! — has  involved  Austin  in — 
in" — (a  fresh  burst  of  tears). 

I  comforted,  scolded,  laughed,  preached,  and  adjured  in  a 
breath;  and  then,  drawing  my  mother  gently  on,  entered  my 
father's  study. 

At  the  table  was  seated  Mr.  Squills,  pen  in  hand,  and  a  glass 
of  his  favourite  punch  by  his  side.  My  father  was  standing  on 
the  hearth,  a  shade  more  pale,  but  with  a  resolute  expression 
on  his  countenance;  which  was  new  to  its  indolent  thoughtful 
mildness.  He  lifted  his  eyes  as  the  door  opened,  and  then, 
]  nit  ting  his  finger  to  his  lips,  as  lie  glanced  towards  my  moth- 
er, he  said  gaily,  "No  great  harm  done.  Don't  believe  her! 
Women  always  exaggerate,  and  make  realities  of  their  own 
bugbears:  it  is  the  vice  of  their  lively  imaginations,  as  Wie- 
rus  has  clearly  shown  in  accounting  for  the  marks,  moles,  and 
hare-lips  which  they  inflict  upon  their  innocent  infants  before 
they  are  even  born.  My  dear  boy,"  added  my  father,  as  I 
here  kissed  him  and  smiled  in  his  face,  tw  I  thank  you  for  that 


A    FAMILY    PICTUKE.  271 

smile !  God  bless  you !"  He  wrung  my  hand,  and  turned  a 
little  aside. 

"It  is  a  great  comfort,"  renewed  my  father,  after  a  short 
pause,  "  to  know,  when  a  misfortune  happens,  that  it  could  not 
be  helped.  Squills  has  just  discovered  that  I  have  no  bump 
of  cautiousness ;  so  that,  craniologically  speaking,  if  I  had  es- 
caped one  imprudence  I  should  certainly  have  run  my  head 
against  another." 

"A  man  with  your  development  is  made  to  be  taken  in," 
said  Mr.  Squills,  consolingly. 

"Do  you  hear  that, my  own  Kitty?  and  have  you  the  heart 
to  blame  Jack  any  longer — a  poor  creature  cursed  with  a  bump 
that  would  take  in  the  Stock  Exchange  ?  And  can  any  one 
resist  his  bump,  Squills  ?" 

"Impossible!"  said  the  surgeon  authoritatively. 

"  Sooner  or  later  it  must  involve  him  in  its  airy  meshes — eh, 
Squills,  entrap  him  into  its  fatal  cerebral  cell.  There  his  fate 
waits  him,  like  the  ant-lion  in  its  pit." 

"  Too  true,"  quoth  Squills.  "  What  a  phrenological  lecturer 
you  would  have  made !" 

"  Go  then,  my  love,"  said  my  father,  "  and  lay  no  blame  but 
on  this  melancholy  cavity  of  mine,  where  cautiousness — is  not ! 
Go,  and  let  Sisty  have  some  supper ;  for  Squills  says  that  he 
has  a  fine  development  of  the  mathematical  organs,  and  we 
want  his  help.     We  are  hard  at  work  on  figures,  Pisistratus." 

My  mother  looked  broken-hearted,  and,  obeying  submis- 
sively, stole  to  the  door  without  a  word.  But  as  she  reached 
the  threshold  she  turned  round,  and  beckoned  to  me  to  follow 
her. 

I  whispered  my  father  and  went  out.  My  mother  was 
standing  in  the  hall,  and  I  saw  by  the  lamp  that  she  had  dried 
her  tears,  and  that  her  face,  though  very  sad,  was  more  com- 
posed. 

"  Sisty,"  she  said,  in  a  low  voice  which  struggled  to  be  firm, 
"  promise  me  that  you  will  tell  me  all — the  worst,  Sisty.  They 
keep  it  from  me,  and  that  is  my  hardest  punishment ;  for  when 
I  don't  know  all  that  he — that  Austin  suffers,  it  seems  to  me 
as  if  I  had  lost  his  heart.  Oh,  Sisty !  my  child,  my  child,  don't 
fear  me !  I  shall  be  happy  whatever  befalls  us,  if  I  once  get 
back  my  privilege — my  privilege,  Sisty,  to  comfort,  to  share ! 
do  you  understand  me  ?" 


272  i  HE  <  \.\  n>\s  : 

kk  Xes,  indeed,  my  mother !  And  with  your  good  sense,  and 
clear  woman's  wit,  if  you  will  but  feel  how  much  we  want 
them,  yon  will  be  the  besl  counsellor  we  could  have.  So  never 
fear;  you  and  I  will  have  no  secrets." 

My  mother  kissed  me,  and  went  away  with  a  less  heavy  step. 

As  1  re-entered,  my  father  came  across  the  room  and  em- 
braced me. 

"My  son,"  he  said,  in  a  faltering  voice,  "if  your  modest 
prospects  in  life  are  ruined" — 

"Father,  lather,  can  you  think  of  me  at  such  a  moment  ! 
Me !  Is  it  possible  to  ruin  the  young,  and  strong,  and  healthy  ! 
Ruin  me,  with  these  thews  and  sinews! — ruin  me,  with  the 
education  you  have  given  me — thews  and  sinews  of  the  mind! 
Oh  no!  there,  Fortune  is  harmless!  And  you  forget,  sir, — 
the  saffron  bag !" 

Squills  leapt  up,  and,  wiping  his  eyes  with  one  hand,  gave 
me  a  sounding  slap  on  the  shoulder  with  the  other. 

"I  am  proud  of  the  care  I  took  of  your  infancy,  Master 
Caxton.  That  comes  of  strengthening  the  digestive  organs  in 
early  childhood.  Such  sentiments  are  a  proof  of  magnificent 
ganglions  in  a  perfect  state  of  order.  When  a  man's  tongue 
is  as  smooth  as  I  am  sure  yours  is,  he  slij)s  through  misfortune 
like  an  eel." 

I  laughed  outright,  my  father  smiled  faintly;  and,  seating 
myself,  I  drew  towards  me  a  paper  filled  with  Squills'  memo- 
randa, and  said,  "  Now  to  find  the  unknown  quantity.  What 
on  earth  is  this  ?  '  Supposed  value  of  books,  £750.'  Oh,  la- 
ther! this  is  impossible.  I  was  prepared  for  anything  but 
that.     Your  books — they  are  your  life !" 

"Nay,"  said  my  father;  "after  all,  they  are  the  offending 
party  in  this  case,  and  so  ought  to  be  the  principal  victims. 
Besides,  I  believe  I  know  most  of  them  by  heart.  But,  in 
truth,  we  arc  only  entering  all  our  effects,  to  be  sure  (added 
my  father  proudly)  that,  come  what  may,  we  are  not  dishon- 
oured." 

"Humour  him,"  whispered  Squills;  "we  will  save  the  books." 
Then  he  added  aloud,  as  he  laid  linger  and  thumb  on  my  pulse, 
"  One,  two,  three,  about  seventy — capital  pulse — soft  and  full 
— lie  can  bear  the  whole:  let  us  administer  it." 

My  father  nodded — "Certainly.  But,  Pisistratus,  we  musl 
manage  your  dear  mother.     Why  she  should  think  of  blaming 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  273 

herself,  because  poor  Jack  took  wrong  ways  to  enrich  us,  I 
cannot  understand.  But  as  I  have  had  occasion  before  to  re- 
mark, Sphinx  is  a  noun  feminine." 

My  poor  father !  that  was  a  vain  struggle  for  thy  wonted 
innocent  humour.     The  lips  quivered. 

Then  the  story  came  out.  It  seems  that,  when  it  was  re- 
solved to  undertake  the  publication  of  the  Literary  Times,  a 
certain  number  of  shareholders  had  been  got  together  by  the 
indefatigable  energies  of  Uncle  Jack ;  and  in  the  deed  of  as- 
sociation and  partnership,  my  father's  name  figured  conspicu- 
ously as  a  holder  of  a  fourth  of  this  joint  property.  If  in  this 
my  father  had  committed  some  imprudence,  he  had  at  least 
done  nothing  that,  according  to  the  ordinary  calculations  of  a 
secluded  student,  could  become  ruinous.  But,  just  at  the  time 
when  we  were  in  the  hurry  of  leaving  town,  Jack  had  repre- 
sented to  my  father  that  it  might  be  necessary  to  alter  a  little 
the  plan  of  the  paper ;  and,  in  order  to  allure  a  larger  circle  of 
readers,  touch  somewhat  on  the  more  vulgar  news  and  inter- 
ests of  the  day.  A  change  of  plan  might  involve  a  change  of 
title ;  and  he  suggested  to  my  father  the  expediency  of  leaving 
the  smooth  hands  of  Mr.  Tibbets  altogether  unfettered,  as  to 
the  technical  name  and  precise  form  of  the  publication.  To 
this  my  father  had  unwittingly  assented,  on  hearing  that  the 
other  shareholders  would  do  the  same.  Mr.  Peck,  a  printer  of 
considerable  opulence,  and  highly  respectable  name,  had  been 
found  to  advance  the  sum  necessary  for  the  publication  of  the 
early  numbers,  upon  the  guarantee  of  the  said  act  of  partner- 
ship and  the  additional  security  of  my  father's  signature  to  a 
document,  authorizing  Mr.  Tibbets  to  make  any  change  in  the 
form  or  title  of  the  periodical  that  might  be  judged  advisable, 
concurrent  with  the  consent  of  the  other  shareholders. 

Xow,  it  seems  that  Mr.  Peck  had,  in  his  previous  conferences 
with  Mr.  Tibbets,  thrown  much  cold  water  on  the  idea  of  the 
Literary  Times,  and  had  suggested  something  that  should 
"  catch  the  monied  public," — the  fact  being,  as  was  afterwards 
discovered,  that  the  printer,  whose  spirit  of  enterprize  was  con- 
genial to  Uncle  Jack's,  had  shares  in  three  or  four  speculations, 
to  which  he  was  naturally  glad  of  an  opportunity  to  invite  the 
attention  of  the  public.  In  a  word,  no  sooner  was  my  poor 
father's  back  turned,  than  the  Literary  Times  was  dropped  in- 
continently, and  Mr.  Peck  and  Mr.  Tibbets  began  to  concen- 

M2 


j 7  1  nil-:  CAXTONB  : 

trate  their  luminons  notions  into  thai  brilliant  and  comet-like 
apparition  which  ultimately  blazed  forth  under  the  title  of  The 
Capitalist. 

From  this  change  of  enterprize  the  more  prudent  and  re- 
sponsible of  the  original  shareholders  had  altogether  with- 
drawn. A  majority,  indeed,  were  left;  but  the  greater  part 
of  those  were  shareholders  of  that  kind  most  amenable  to  the 
influences  of  Uncle  Jack,  and  willing  to  be  shareholders  in  any- 
thing, since  as  yet  they  were  possessors  of  nothing. 

Assured  of  my  father's  responsibility,  the  adventurous  Peek 
put  plenty  of  spirit  into  the  first  launch  of  The  Capitalist.  All 
the  walls  were  placarded  with  its  announcements ;  circular  ad- 
vertisements ran  from  one  end  of  the  kingdom  to  the  other. 
Agents  were  engaged,  correspondents  levied  en  masse.  The 
invasion  of  Xerxes  on  the  Greeks  was  not  more  munificently 
provided  for  than  that  of  The  Capitalist  upon  the  credulity 
and  avarice  of  mankind. 

But  as  Providence  bestows  upon  fishes  the  instrument  of 
fins,  whereby  they  balance  and  direct  their  movements,  how- 
over  rapid  and  erratic,  through  the  pathless  deeps;  so  to  the 
cold-blooded  creatures  of  our  own  species — that  may  be  class- 
ed under  the  genus  money-makers — the  same  protective  power 
accords  the  fin-like  properties  of  prudence  and  caution,  where- 
with your  true  money-getter  buoys  and  guides  himself  ma- 
jestically through  the  great  seas  of  speculation.  In  short,  the 
fishes  the  net  was  cast  for  were  all  scared  from  the  surface  at 
the  first  splash.  They  came  round  and  smelt  at  the  mesh  with 
their  sharp  bottle-noses,  and  then,  plying  those  invaluable  fins, 
made  off  as  fast  as  they  could — plunging  into  the  mud — hiding 
themselves  under  rocks  and  coral  banks.  Metaphor  apart,  the 
capitalists  buttoned  up  their  pockets,  and  would  have  nothing 
to  say  to  their  namesake. 

Not  a  word  of  this  change,  so  abhorrent  to  all  the  notions 
of  poor  Augustine  Caxton,  had  been  breathed  to  him  by  Peck 
or  Tibbets.  He  ate,  and  slept,  and  worked  at  the  Great  Book, 
occasionally  wondering  why  he  had  not  heard  of  the  advent  of 
the  Literary  Times,  unconscious  of  all  the  awful  responsibili- 
ties which  Tin  Capitalist  was  entailing  on  him; — knowing  no 
more  of  The  Capitalist  than  he  did  of  the  last  loan  of  the 
Rothschilds. 

Difficult  was  it  for  all  other  human  nature,  save  my  lather's, 


A    FAMILY   PICTUUE.  275 

not  to  breathe  an  indignant  anathema  on  the  scheming  head 
of  the  brother-in-law  who  had  thus  violated  the  most  sacred 
obligations  of  trust  and  kindred,  and  so  entangled  an  unsus- 
pecting recluse.  But,  to  give  even  Jack  Tibbets  his  due,  he 
had  firmly  convinced  himself  that  The  Capitalist  would  make 
my  father's  fortune ;  and  if  he  did  not  announce  to  him  the 
strange  and  anomalous  development  into  which  the  original 
sleeping  chrysalis  of  the  Literary  Times  had  taken  portentous 
wing,  it  was  purely  and  wholly  in  the  knowledge  that  my  fa- 
ther's "  prejudices,"  as  he  termed  them,  would  stand  in  the 
way  of  his  becoming  a  Croesus.  And,  in  fact,  Uncle  Jack  had 
believed  so  heartily  in  his  own  project,  that  he  had  put  himself 
thoroughly  into  Mr.  Peck's  power,  signed  bills,  in  his  own 
name,  to  some  fabulous  amount,  and  was  actually  now  in  the 
Fleet,  whence  his  penitential  and  despairing  confession  was 
dated,  arriving  simultaneously  with  a  short  letter  from  Mr. 
Peck,  wherein  that  respectable  printer  apprised  my  father  that 
he  had  continued,  at  his  own  risk,  the  publication  of  TJie  Capi- 
talist, as  far  as  a  prudent  care  for  his  family  would  permit; 
that  he  need  not  say  that  a  new  daily  journal  was  a  very  vast 
experiment ;  that  the  expense  of  such  a  paper  as  The  Capitalist 
was  immeasurably  greater  than  that  of  a  mere  literary  period- 
ical, as  originally  suggested  ;  and  that  now,  being  constrained 
to  come  upon  the  shareholders  for  the  sums  he  had  advanced, 
amounting  to  several  thousands,  he  requested  my  father  to  set- 
tle with  him  immediately — delicately  implying  that  Mr.  Cax- 
ton  himself  might  settle  as  he  could  with  the  other  sharehold- 
ers, most  of  whom,  he  grieved  to  add,  he  had  been  misled  by 
Mr.  Tibbets  into  believing  to  be  men  of  substance,  when  in  re- 
ality they  were  men  of  straw ! 

Nor  was  this  all  the  evil.  The  "  Great  Anti-Bookseller  Pub- 
lishing Society" — which  had  maintained  a  struggling  existence 
— evinced  by  advertisements  of  sundry  forthcoming  works  of 
solid  interest  and  enduring  nature,  wherein,  out  of  a  long  list, 
amidst  a  pompous  array  of  "Poems,"  "Dramas  not  intended 
for  the  Stage,"  "  Essays  by  Phileutheros,  Philanthropos,  Phi- 
lopolis,  Philodemus,  and  Philalethes,"  stood  prominently  forth, 
"  The  History  of  Human  Error,  Vols.  I.  and  II.,  quarto,  with 
illustrations," — the  "Anti-Bookseller  Society,"  I  say,  that  had 
hitherto  evinced  nascent  and  budding  life  by  these  exfoliations 
from  its  slender  stem,  died  of  a  sudden  blight,  the  moment  its 


276  THE   cantons: 

sun,  in  the  Bhape  of  Uncle  Jack,  Bel  in  the  Cimmerian  regions 
of  the  Fleet  :  and  a  polite  letter  from  another  printer  (<>  Wil- 
liam Caxton,  William  Caxton! — fatal  progenitor!),  informing 
my  father  of  this  event,  stated  complimentarily  that  it  was  to 
him,  kbas  the  most  respectable  member  of  the  Association," 
that  the  said  printer  would  be  compelled  to  look  for  expenses 
incurred,  not  only  in  the  very  costly  edition  of  the  "History 
of  Human  Error,"  but  for  those  incurred  in  the  print  and  pa- 
per devoted  to  "Poems,"  "Dramas  not  intended  for  the  Stage," 
w>  Essays  by  Phileutheros,  Philanthropos,  Philopolis,  Philode- 
mus,  and  Philalethes,"  with  sundry  other  works,  no  doubt  of  a 
very  valuable  nature,  but  in  which  a  considerable  loss,  in  a  pe- 
cuniary point  of  view,  must  be  necessarily  expected. 

I  own  that,  as  soon  as  I  had  mastered  the  above  agreeable 
facts,  and  ascertained  from  Mr.  Squills  that  my  father  really 
did  seem  to  have  rendered  himself  legally  liable  to  these  de- 
mands, I  leant  back  in  my  chair,  stunned  and  bewildered. 

"  So  you  see,"  said  my  father,  "  that  as  yet  Ave  are  contend- 
ing with  monsters  in  the  dark — in  the  dark  all  monsters  look 
larger  and  uglier.  Even  Augustus  Caesar,  though  certainly  he 
had  never  scrupled  to  make  as  many  ghosts  as  suited  his  con- 
venience, did  not  like  the  chance  of  a  visit  from  them,  and  nev- 
er sat  alone  in  teiiebris.  What  the  amount  of  the  sums  claim- 
ed from  me  may  be,  we  know  not ;  what  may  be  gained  from 
the  other  shareholders  is  equally  obscure  and  undefined.  But 
the  first  thing  to  do  is  to  get  poor  Jack  out  of  prison." 

"Uncle  Jack  out  of  prison!"  exclaimed  I:  "surely,  sir,  that 
is  carrying  forgiveness  too  far." 

"Why,  he  would  not  have  been  in  prison  if  I  had  not  been 
so  blindly  forgetful  of  his  weakness,  poor  man !  I  ought  to 
have  known  better.  But  my  vanity  misled  me  ;  I  must  needs 
publish  a  great  book,  as  if  (said  Mr.  Caxton,  looking  round  the 
shelves)  there  were  not  great  books  enough  in  the  world!  I 
musl  needs,  too,  think  of  advancing  and  circulating  knowledge 
in  the  form  of  a  journal — I,  who  had  not  knowledge  enough  of 
the  character  of  my  own  brother-in-law  to  keep  myself  from 
ruin  !  Come  what  will,  I  should  think  myself  the  meanest  of 
men  to  let  that  poor  creature,  whom  I  ought  to  have  consider- 
ed as  a  monomaniac,  rot  in  prison,  because  I,  Austin  Caxton, 
Wanted  common  sense.  And  (concluded  my  father,  resolute- 
ly) he  is  your  mother's  brother,  Pisistratus.    I  should  have 


A   FAMILY    PICTUEE.  277 

gone  to  town  at  once;  but, hearing  that  my  wife  had  written 
to  you,  I  waited  till  I  could  leave  her  to  the  companionship  of 
hope  and  comfort — two  blessings  that  smile  upon  every  moth- 
er in  the  face  of  a  son  like  you.     To-morrow  I  go." 

"  Not  a  bit  of  it,"  said  Mr.  Squills  firmly ;  "  as  your  med- 
ical adviser,  I  forbid  you  to  leave  the  house  for  the  next  six 
days." 


CHAPTER  II. 

"  Sie,"  continued  Mr.  Squills,  biting  off  the  end  of  a  cigar 
which  he  pulled  from  his  pocket,  "you  concede  to  me  that  it 
is  a  very  important  business  on  which  you  propose  to  go  to 
London." 

"  Of  that  there  is  no  doubt,"  replied  my  father. 

"  And  the  doing  of  business  well  or  ill  entirely  depends  upon 
the  habit  of  body !"  cried  Mr.  Squills  triumphantly.  "  Do  you 
know,  Mr.  Caxton,  that  while  you  are  looking  so  calm,  and 
talking  so  quietly — just  on  purpose  to  sustain  your  son  and  de- 
lude your  wife — do  you  know  that  your  pulse,  which  is  natu- 
rally little  more  than  sixty,  is  nearly  a  hundred?  Do  you 
know,  sir,  that  your  mucous  membranes  are  in  a  state  of  high 
irritation,  apparent  by  the  papiUce  at  the  tip  of  your  tongue  ? 
And  if,  with  a  pulse  like  this,  and  a  tongue  like  that,  you  think 
of  settling  money  matters  with  a  set  of  sharp-witted  trades- 
men, all  I  can  say  is,  that  you  are  a  ruined  man." 

"  But" — began  my  father. 

"Did  not  Squire  Rollick,"  pursued  Mr.  Squills — "Squire 
Rollick,  the  hardest  head  at  a  bargain  I  know  of — did  not 
Squire  Rollick  sell  that  pretty  little  farm  of  his,  Scranny  Holt, 
for  thirty  per  cent,  below  its  value  ?  And  what  was  the  cause, 
sir  ? — the  whole  country  was  in  amaze  ! — what  was  the  cause, 
but  an  incipient  simmering  attack  of  the  yellow  jaundice, 
which  made  him  take  a  gloomy  view  of  human  life,  and  the 
agricultural  interest?  On  the  other  hand,  did  not  Lawyer 
Cool,  the  most  prudent  man  in  the  three  kingdoms — Lawyer 
Cool,  who  was  so  methodical,  that  all  the  clocks  in  the  county 
were  set  by  his  watch — plunge  one  morning  head  over  heels 
into  a  frantic  speculation  for  cultivating  the  bogs  in  Ireland 
(his  watch  did  not  go  right  for  the  next  three  months,  which 


•2^X  THE   CAXTONS  : 

made  our  whole  Bhire  an  hour  in  advance  of  the  reel  of  En- 
gland!)    Ami  whal  was  the  cause  of  thai  nobody  knew,  till  I 

was  called  in,  and  found  the  cerebral  membrane  in  a  slate  of 
acute  irritation,  probably  just  in  the  region  of  his  acquisitive- 
ness and  ideality.     No,  Mr.  Caxton,  you  will  stay  at  home,  and 

take  a  soothing  preparation  I  shall  send  you  of  lettuce-leaves 
and  marsh-mallows.      Bui  I,"  continued  Squills,  lighting  his 

cigar,  and  taking  two  determined  whiffs — "but  /will  go  up 
to  town  and  settle  the  business  for  you,  and  take  with  me  this 
young  gentleman,  whose  digestive  functions  are  just  in  a  state 
to  deal  safely  with  those  horrible  elements  of  dyspepsia — the 
L.S.D." 

As  he  spoke,  Mr.  Squills  set  his  foot  significantly  upon  mine. 

"But,"  resumed  my  father  mildly,  "though  I  thank  you 
very  much,  Squills,  for  your  kind  offer,  I  do  not  recognize  the 
necessity  of  accepting  it.  I  am  not  so  bad  a  philosopher  as 
you  seem  to  imagine ;  and  the  blow  I  have  received  has  not 
so  deranged  my  physical  organization  as  to  render  me  unfit  to 
transact  my  affairs." 

"  Hum !"  grunted  Squills,  starting  up  and  seizing  my  fa- 
ther's pulse;  "ninety-six  —  ninety-six  if  a  beat!  And  the 
tongue,  sir !" 

kw  Pshaw!"  quoth  my  father,  "you  have  not  even  seen  my 
tongue !" 

"  No  need  of  that,  I  know  what  it  is  by  the  state  of  the  eye- 
lids— tip  scarlet,  sides  rough  as  a  nutmeg-grater!" 

"Pshaw!"  again  said  my  father, this  time  impatiently. 

"Well,"  said  Squills  solemnly,  "it  is  my  duty  to  say  (hero 
my  mother  entered,  to  tell  me  that  supper  was  ready),  and  I 
say  it  to  you,  Mrs.  Caxton,  and  to  you,  Mr.  Pisistratus  Cax- 
ton, as  the  parties  most  nearly  interested,  that  if  you,  sir,  go 
to  London  upon  this  matter,  I'll  not  answer  for  the  conse- 
quences." 

"Oh!  Austin,  Austin,"  cried  my  mother,  running  up  and 
throwing  her  arms  round  my  father's  neck;  while  I,  little  less 
alarmed  by  Squills'  serious  tone  and  aspect,  represented  strong- 
ly the  inutility  of  Mr.  Caxton's  personal  interference  at  the 
presenl  moment.  All  he  could  do  on  arriving  in  town  would 
he  t..  put  the  matter  into  the  hands  of  a  good  lawyer,  and  that 
we  could  do  for  him;  it  would  be  time  enough  to  send  for 
him  when  the  extent  of  the  mischief  done  was  more  clearly 


A    FAMILY   PICTURE.  279 

ascertained.  Meanwhile  Squills  griped  my  father's  pulse,  and 
my  mother  hung  on  his  neck. 

"Ninety-six — ninety-seven!"  groaned  Squills  in  a  hollow 
voice. 

"  I  don't  believe  it !"  cried  my  father,  almost  in  a  passion — 
"  never  better  nor  cooler  in  my  life." 

"And  the  tongue — look  at  his  tongue,  Mrs.  Caxton — a 
tongue,  ma'am,  so  bright  that  you  could  see  to  read  by  it !" 

"  Oh !  Austin,  Austin !" 

"  My  dear,  it  is  not  my  tongue  that  is  in  fault,  I  assure  you," 
said  my  father,  speaking  through  his  teeth ;  "  and  the  man 
knows  no  more  of  my  tongue  than  he  does  of  the  Mysteries 
of  Eleusis." 

"  Put  it  out  then,"  exclaimed  Squills,  "  and  if  it  be  not  as 
I  say,  you  have  my  leave  to  go  to  London,  and  throw  your 
whole  fortune  into  the  two  great  pits  you  have  dug  for  it. 
Put  it  out !" 

"  Mr.  Squills  !"  said  my  father,  colouring — "  Mr.  Squills,  for 
shame !" 

"Dear,  dear  Austin!  your  hand  is  so  hot — you  are  feverish, 
I  am  sure." 

"Not  a  bit  of  it." 

"  But,  sir,  only  just  gratify  Mr.  Squills,"  said  I  coaxingly. 

"There,  there!"  said  my  father,  fairly  baited  into  submis- 
sion, and  shyly  exhibiting  for  a  moment  the  extremest  end  of 
the  vanquished  organ  of  eloquence. 

Squills  darted  forward  his  lynx-like  eyes.  "  Red  as  a  lob- 
ster, and  rough  as  a  gooseberry-bush !"  cried  Squills,  in  a  tone 
of  savage  joy. 


CHAPTER  III. 

How  was  it  possible  for  one  poor  tongue,  so  reviled  and  per- 
secuted, so  humbled,  insulted,  and  triumphed  over,  to  resist 
three  tongues  in  league  against  it  ? 

Finally,  my  father  yielded,  and  Squills,  in  high  spirits,  de- 
clared that  he  would  go  to  supper  with  me,  to  see  that  I  ate 
nothing  that  could  tend  to  discredit  his  reliance  upon  my  sys- 
tem. Leaving  my  mother  still  with  her  Austin,  the  good  sur- 
geon then  took  my  arm,  and,  as  soon  as  we  were  in  the  next 


280  the  caxtons: 

room,  Bhut  the  door  carefully,  wiped  his  forehead,  and  said — 
"  I  think  we  have  saved  him !" 

k-  Would  it  really,  then,  have  injured  my  father  so  much  '.■'■, 

"So  much! — why,  you  foolish  young  man,  don't  you  see 
that,  with  liis  ignorance  of  business,  where  lie  himself  is  con- 
cerned — though  for  any  other  one's  business,  neither  Rollick 
Dor  Cool  lias  a  better  judgment — and  with  his  d — d  Quixotic 
spirit  of  honour  worked  up  into  a  state  of  excitement,  he  would 
have  rushed  to  Mr.  Tibbets,  and  exclaimed,  'How  much  do 
you  owe?  there  it  is!'  settled  in  the  same  way  with  these 
printers,  and  come  back  without  a  sixpence  ;  whereas  you  and 
I  can  look  coolly  about  us,  and  reduce  the  inflammation  to  the 
minimum !" 

"  I  see,  and  thank  you  heartily,  Squills." 

"  Besides,"  said  the  surgeon,  with  more  feeling,  "  your  father 
has  really  been  making  a  noble  effort  over  himself.  He  suffers 
more  than  you  would  think — not  for  himself  (for  I  do  believe 
that,  if  he  were  alone  in  the  world,  he  would  be  quite  content- 
ed if  he  could  save  fifty  pounds  a-year  and  his  books),  but  for 
your  mother  and  yourself;  and  a  fresh  access  of  emotional  ex- 
citement, all  the  nervous  anxiety  of  a  journey  to  London  on 
such  a  business  might  have  ended  in  a  paralytic  or  epileptic 
affection.  Xow  we  have  him  here  snug ;  and  the  worst  news 
we  can  give  him  will  be  better  than  what  he  will  make  up  his 
mind  for.     But  you  don't  eat." 

"  Eat !     How  can  I  ?     My  poor  father !" 

"  The  effect  of  grief  on  the  gastric  juices,  through  the  nerv- 
ous system,  is  very  remarkable,"  said  Mr.  Squills,  philosophic- 
ally, and  helping  himself  to  a  broiled  bone;  "it  increases  the 
thirst,  while  it  takes  away  hunger.  No — don't  touch  port ! — 
heating !     Sherry  and  water." 


CHAPTER  IV. 

The  house-door  had  closed  upon  Mr.  Squills — that  gentle- 
man having  promised  to  breakfast  with  me  the  next  morn- 
ing, so  that  we  might  take  the  coach  from  our  gate — and  I  re- 
mained alone,  seated  by  the  supper-table,  and  revolving  all  I 
had  heard,  when  my  father  walked  in. 

" Pisistratus,"   said   he,  gravely,  and  looking  around  him, 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  281 

"your  mother ! — suppose  the  worst — your  first  care,  then,  must 
be  to  try  and  secure  something  for  her.  You  and  I  are  men — 
we  can  never  want,  while  we  have  health  of  mind  and  body ; 
but  a  woman — and  if  anything  happens  to  me — " 

My  father's  lip  writhed  as  it  uttered  these  brief  sentences. 

"  My  dear,  dear  father !"  said  I,  suppressing  my  tears  with 
difficulty,  "  all  evils,  as  you  yourself  said,  look  worse  by  antici- 
pation. It  is  impossible  that  your  whole  fortune  can  be  in- 
volved. The  newspaper  did  not  run  many  weeks ;  and  only 
the  first  volume  of  your  work  is  printed.  Besides,  there  must 
be  other  shareholders  who  will  pay  their  quota.  Believe  me, 
I  feel  sanguine  as  to  the  result  of  my  embassy.  As  for  my 
poor  mother,  it  is  not  the  loss  of  fortune  that  will  wound  her 
— depend  upon  it,  she  thinks  very  little  of  that ;  it  is  the  loss 
of  your  confidence." 

"  My  confidence !" 

"  Ah,  yes !  tell  her  all  your  fears,  as  your  hopes.  Do  not 
let  your  affectionate  pity  exclude  her  from  one  corner  of  your 
heart." 

"  It  is  that — it  is  that,  Austin, — my  husband — my  joy — my 
pride — my  soul — my  all !"  cried  a  soft  broken  voice. 

My  mother  had  crept  in,  unobserved  by  us. 

My  father  looked  at  us  both,  and  the  tears  which  had  before 
stood  in  his  eyes  forced  their  way.  Then  opening  his  arms, 
into  which  his  Kitty  threw  herself  joyfully,  he  lifted  those 
moist  eyes  upward,  and,  by  the  movement  of  his  lips,  I  saw 
that  he  thanked  God. 

I  stole  out  of  the  room.  I  felt  that  those  two  hearts  should 
be  left  to  beat  and  to  blend  alone.  And  from  that  hour,  I  am 
convinced  that  Augustine  Caxton  acquired  a  stouter  philos- 
ophy than  that  of  the  stoics.  The  fortitude  that  concealed 
pain  was  no  longer  needed,  for  the  pain  was  no  longer  felt. 


CHAPTER  V. 

Mr.  Squills  and  I  performed  our  journey  without  adven- 
ture, and,  as  we  were  not  alone  on  the  coach,  with  little  con- 
versation. We  put  up  at  a  small  inn  in  the  City,  and  the  next 
morning  I  sallied  forth  to  see  Trevanion — for  we  agreed  that 
he  would  be  the  best  person  to  advise  us.     But,  on  arriving  at 


2S2  i  in:  l  a.xto.ns  : 

St.  James's  Square,!  had  the  disappointment  of  hearing  that 
the  whole  family  had  gone  to  Paris  three  days  before,  and 
were  Dot  expected  to  return  till  the  meeting  of  Parliament. 

This  was  a  Bad  discouragement,  for  I  had  counted  much  on 
Trevanion's  clear  head,  and  that  extraordinary  range  of  accom- 
plishment in  all  matters  of  business — all  that  related  to  practi- 
cal life — which  my  old  patron  pre-eminently  possessed.  The 
next  thing  would  be  to  find  Trevanion's  lawyer  (for  Trevanion 
was  one  of  those  men  whose  solicitors  are  sure  to  be  able  and 
active).  But  the  fact  was,  that  he  left  so  little  to  lawyers,  that 
he  had  never  had  occasion  to  communicate  wTith  one  since  I 
had  known  him ;  and  I  was  therefore  in  ignorance  of  the  very 
name  of  his  solicitor;  nor  could  the  porter,  who  was  left  in 
charge  of  the  house,  enlighten  me.  Luckily,  I  bethought  my- 
self of  Sir  Sedley  Beaudesert,  who  could  scarcely  tail  to  give 
me  the  information  required,  and  who,  at  all  events,  might  rec- 
ommend to  me  some  other  lawyer.     So  to  him  I  w  ent. 

I  found  Sir  Sedley  at  breakfast  with  a  young  gentleman  who 
seemed  about  twenty.  The  good  baronet  was  delighted  to  see 
me;  but  I  thought  it  w^as  with  a  little  confusion,  rare  to  his 
cordial  ease,  that  he  presented  me  to  his  cousin,  Lord  Castle- 
ton.  It  was  a  name  familiar  to  me,  though  I  had  never  before 
met  its  patrician  owner. 

The  Marquess  of  Castleton  was  indeed  a  subject  of  envy  to 
young  idlers,  and  afforded  a  theme  of  interest  to  gray-beard 
politicians.  Often  had  I  heard  of  "that  lucky  fellow  Castle- 
ton," who,  when  of  age,  would  step  into  one  of  those  colossal 
fortunes  which  would  realize  the  dreams  of  Aladdin — a  fortune 
thai  had  been  sent  out  to  nurse  since  his  minority.  Often  had 
I  heard  graver  gossips  wonder  whether  Castleton  would  take 
any  active  part  in  public  life — whether  he  would  keep  up  the 
family  influence.  His  mother  (still  alive)  was  a  superior  wom- 
an, and  had  devoted  herself,  from  his  childhood,  to  supply  a 
father's  loss,  and  lit  him  for  his  great  position.  It  was  said 
that  he  was  clever — had  been  educated  by  a  tutor  of  great  ac- 
ademic distinction,  and  was  reading  for  a  double  iirst  class  at 
Oxford.  This  young  marquess  was  indeed  the  head  of  one  of 
those  few  houses  still  left  in  England  that  retain  feudal  import- 
ance.     He  was  important,  nol   only  from  his  rank  and  his  vast 

fortune,  but  from  an  immense  circle  of  powerful  connections; 
from  the  ability   of  his  two  predecessors,  who  had  been  keen 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  283 

politicians  and  cabinet-ministers ;  from  the  prestige  they  had 
bequeathed  to  his  name ;  from  the  peculiar  nature  of  his  prop- 
erty, which  gave  him  the  returning  interest  in  no  less  than  six 
parliamentary  seats  in  Great  Britain  and  Ireland — besides  the 
indirect  ascendency  which  the  head  of  the  Castletons  had  al- 
ways exercised  over  many  powerful  and  noble  allies  of  that 
princely  house.  I  was  not  aware  that  he  was  related  to  Sir 
Sedley,  whose  world  of  action  was  so  remote  from  politics ;  and 
it  was  with  some  surprise  that  I  now  heard  that  announce- 
ment, and  certainly  with  some  interest  that  I,  perhaps  from  the 
verge  of  poverty,  gazed  on  this  young  heir  of  fabulous  El  Do- 
rados. 

It  was  easy  to  see  that  Lord  Castleton  had  been  brought  up 
with  a  careful  knowledge  of  his  future  greatness,  and  its  seri- 
ous responsibilities.  He  stood  immeasurably  aloof  from  all  the 
affectations  common  to  the  youth  of  minor  patricians.  He  had 
not  been  taught  to  value  himself  on  the  cut  of  a  coat,  or  the 
shape  of  a  hat.  His  world  was  far  above  St.  James's  Street 
and  the  clubs.  He  was  dressed  plainly,  though  in  a  style  pe- 
culiar to  himself— a  white  neckcloth  (which  was  not  at  that 
day  quite  so  uncommon  for  morning  use  as  it  is  now),  trousers 
without  straps,  thin  shoes  and  gaiters.  In  his  maimer  there 
was  nothing  of  the  supercilious  apathy  which  characterizes  the 
dandy  introduced  to  some  one  whom  he  doubts  if  he  can  nod 
to  from  the  bow-window  at  White's — none  of  such  vulgar  cox- 
combries had  Lord  Castleton ;  and  yet  a  young  gentleman  more 
emphatically  coxcomb  it  was  impossible  to  see.  He  had  been 
told,  no  doubt,  that,  as  the  head  of  a  house  which  was  almost 
in  itself  a  party  in  the  state,  he  should  be  bland  and  civil  to  all 
men ;  and  this  duty  being  grafted  upon  a  nature  singularly  cold 
and  unsocial,  gave  to  his  politeness  something  so  stiff,  yet  so 
condescending,  that  it  brought  the  blood  to  one's  cheek — though 
the  momentary  anger  was  counterbalanced  by  a  sense  of  the 
almost  ludicrous  contrast  between  this  gracious  majesty  of  de- 
portment, and  the  insignificant  figure,  with  the  boyish  beard- 
less face,  by  which  it  was  assumed.  Lord  Castleton  did  not 
content  himself  with  a  mere  bow  at  our  introduction.  Much 
to  my  wonder  how  he  came  by  the  information  he  displayed, 
he  made  me  a  little  speech  after  the  manner  of  Louis  XIV.  to 
a  provincial  noble — studiously  modelled  upon  that  royal  max- 
im of  urbane  policy  which  instructs  a  king  that  he  should  know 


2S4  THE   CAXT0N8  : 

something  of  the  birth,  parentage,  and  family  of  his  meanest 
gentleman.  It  was  a  little  speech,  in  which  my  father's  Learn- 
ing, and  my  uncle's  services,  and  the  amiable  qualities  of  your 
humble  servant,  were  neatly  interwoven — delivered  in  a  falsetto 
tone,  as  if  Learned  by  heart,  though  it  must  have  been  neces- 
sarily impromptu  :  and  then,  reseating  himself,  he  made  a  gra- 
cious motion  of  the  head  and  hand,  as  if  to  authorize  me  to  do 
the  same. 

Conversation  succeeded,  by  galvanic  jerks  and  spasmodic 
starts — a  conversation  that  Lord  Castleton  contrived  to  tug  so 
completely  out  of  poor  Sir  Sedley's  ordinary  course  of  small 
and  polished  small-talk,  that  that  charming  personage,  accus- 
tomed, as  lie  well  deserved,  to  be  Coryphaeus  at  his  own  table, 
was  completely  silenced.  With  his  light  reading,his  rich  stores 
of  anecdote,  his  good-humoured  knowledge  of  the  drawing- 
room  world,  he  had  scarce  a  word  that  would  fit  into  the  great, 
rough,  serious  matters  which  Lord  Castleton  threw  upon  the 
table,  as  he  nibbled  his  toast.  Nothing  but  the  most  grave 
and  practical  subjects  of  human  interest  seemed  to  attract  this 
future  leader  of  mankind.  The  fact  is,  that  Lord  Castleton 
had  been  taught  everything  that  relates  to  property — (a  knowl- 
edge which  embraces  a  very  wide  circumference).  It  had  been 
said  to  him,  "You  will  be  an  immense  proprietor — knowledge 
is  essential  to  your  self-preservation.  You  will  be  puzzled, 
bubbled,  ridiculed,  duped  every  day  of  your  life,  if  you  do  not 
make  yourself  acquainted  with  all  by  which  property  is  assail- 
ed or  defended,  impoverished  or  increased.  You  have  a  vast 
stake  in  the  country — you  must  learn  all  the  interests  of  Eu- 
rope— nay,  of  the  civilized  world — for  those  interests  react  on 
the  country,  and  the  interests  of  the  country  are  of  the  great- 
est possible  consequence  to  the  interests  of  the  Marquess  of 
Castleton."  Thus  the  state  of  the  Continent — the  policy  o'f 
Metternich — the  condition  of  the  Papacy — the  growth  of  Dis- 
sent— the  proper  mode  of  dealing  with  the  general  spirit  of 
Democracy,  which  was  the  epidemic  of  European  monarchies 
— the  relative  proportions  of  the  agricultural  and  manufactur- 
ing population — corn-laws,  currency,  and  the  laws  that  regu- 
late wages — a  criticism  on  the  leading  speakers  of  the  House 
of  ( "ominous,  with  sonic  discursive  observations  on  the  import  - 
ance  of  fattening  cattle — the  introduction  of  flax  into  Ireland 
— emigration — the  condition  of  the  poor — the  doctrines  of  Mr. 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  285 

Owen — the  pathology  of  potatoes  ;  the  connection  between 
potatoes,  pauperism,  and  patriotism  ;  these,  and  such-like  stu- 
pendous subjects  for  reflection — all  branching  more  or  less  in- 
tricately from  the  single  idea  of  the  Castleton  property — the 
young  lord  discussed  and  disposed  of  in  half-a-dozen  prim, 
poised  sentences — evincing,  I  must  say  in  justice,  no  inconsid- 
erable information,  and  a  mighty  solemn  turn  of  mind.  The 
oddity  was,  that  the  subjects  so  selected  and  treated  should 
not  come  rather  from  some  young  barrister,  or  mature  political 
economist,  than  from  so  gorgeous  a  lily  of  the  field.  Of  a  man 
less  elevated  in  rank  one  would  certainly  have  said — "  Clever- 
ish,  but  a  prig ;"  but  there  really  was  something  so  respecta- 
ble in  a  personage  born  to  such  fortunes,  and  having  nothing 
to  do  but  to  bask  in  the  sunshine,  voluntarily  taking  such  pains 
with  himself,  and  condescending  to  identify  his  own  interests 
— the  interests  of  the  Castleton  property — with  the  concerns 
of  his  lesser  fellow-mortals,  that  one  felt  the  young  marquess 
had  in  him  the  stuff  to  become  a  very  considerable  man. 

Poor  Sir  Sedley,  to  whom  all  these  matters  were  as  unfamil- 
iar as  the  theology  of  the  Talmud,  after  some  vain  efforts  to 
slide  the  conversation  into  easier  grooves,  fairly  gave  in,  and, 
with  a  compassionate  smile  on  his  handsome  countenance, 
took  refuge  in  his  easy-chair  and  the  contemplation  of  his  snuff- 
box. 

At  last,  to  our  great  relief,  the  servant  announced  Lord  Cas- 
tleton's  carriage  :  and  with  another  speech  of  overpowering 
affability  to  me,  and  a  cold  shake  of  the  hand  to  Sir  Sedley, 
Lord  Castleton  went  his  way. 

The  breakfast-parlour  looked  on  the  street,  and  I  turned  me- 
chanically to  the  window  as  Sir  Sedley  followed  his  guest  out 
of  the  room.  A  travelling  carriage  with  four  post-horses  was 
at  the  door ;  and  a  servant,  who  looked  like  a  foreigner,  was  in 
waiting  with  his  master's  cloak.  As  I  saw  Lord  Castleton 
step  into  the  street,  and  wrap  himself  in  his  costly  mantle  lined 
with  sables,  I  observed,  more  than  I  had  while  he  was  in  the 
room,  the  enervate  slightness  of  his  frail  form,  and  the  more 
than  paleness  of  his  thin  joyless  face  ;  and  then,  instead  of  en- 
vy, I  felt  compassion  for  the  owner  of  all  this  pomp  and  grand- 
eur— felt  that  I  would  not  have  exchanged  my  hardy  health, 
and  easy  humour,  and  vivid  capacities  of  enjoyment  in  things 
the  slightest  and  most  within  the  reach  of  all  men,  for  the 


286  i  mi:  caxtons: 

wealth  and  greatness  which  that  poor  youth  perhaps  deserved 
the  more  for  putting  them  so  little  to  the  service  of  pleasure. 

"  Well,"  said  Sir  Sedley,  "and  what,  do  you  think  of  him  ?" 

v-  Be  is  just  the  sort  of  man  Trevanion  would  like,"  said  J, 
evasively. 

"That  is  true,"  answered  Sir  Sedley,  in  a  serious  tone  of 
voice,  and  looking  at  me  somewhat  earnestly.  "Have  you 
heard  ? — but  no,  you  cannot  have  heard  yet." 

"Heard  what?" 

"  My  dear  young  friend,"  said  the  kindest  and  most  delicate 
of  all  line  gentlemen,  sauntering  away  that  he  might  not  ob- 
serve  the  emotion  he  caused,  "Lord  Castleton  is  going  to  Par- 
is to  join  the  Trevanions.  The  object  Lady  Ellinor  has  had 
at  heart  for  many  a  long  year  is  won,  and  our  pretty  Fanny 
will  be  Marchioness  of  Castleton  when  her  betrothed  is  of  age 
— that  is,  in  six  months.  The  two  mothers  have  settled  it  all 
between  them !" 

I  made  no  answer,  but  continued  to  look  out  of  the  window. 

"  This  alliance,"  resumed  Sir  Sedley,  "  was  all  that  was  want- 
ing to  assure  Trevanion's  position.  When  parliament  meets, 
he  will  have  some  great  office.  Poor  man !  how  I  shall  pity 
him  !  It  is  extraordinary  to  me,"  continued  Sir  Sedley,  benev- 
olently going  on,  that  I  might  have  full  time  to  recover  my- 
self, "  how  contagious  that  disease  called  '  business'  is  in  our 
foggy  England !  Not  only  Trevanion,  you  see,  has  the  com- 
plaint in  its  very  worst  and  most  complicated  form,  but  that 
poor  dear  cousin  of  mine,  who  is  so  young  (here  Sir  Sedley 
sighed),  and  might  enjoy  himself  so  much,  is  worse  than  you 
were  when  Trevanion  was  fagging  you  to  death.  But,  to  be 
sure,  a  great  name  and  position,  like  Castleton's,  must  be  a  very 
heavy  affliction  to  a  conscientious  mind.  You  see  how  the 
sense  of  its  responsibilities  has  aged  him  already — positively, 
two  great  wrinkles  under  his  eyes.  Well,  after  all,  I  admire 
him,  and  respect  his  tutor;  a  soil  naturally  very  thin,  I  suspect, 
has  been  most  carefully  cultivated;  and  Castleton,  with  Trc- 
vanion's  help,  will  be  the  first  man  in  the  peerage — prime  minis- 
ter  sonic  day,  I  dare  say.  And  when  T  think  of  it,  how  grate- 
ful I  ought  to  feel  to  his  father  and  mother,  who  produced  him 
quite  in  their  old  age;  for,  if  he  had  not  been  born,  I  should 
have  been  iln-  m<  »<t  miserable  of  men — yes,  positively,  thai  hor- 
rible marquisate  would  have  come  t<>  me  !     I  never  think  ever 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  287 

Horace  Walpole's  regrets,  when  he  got  the  earldom  of  Oxford, 
without  the  deepest  sympathy,  and  without  a  shudder  at  the 
thought  of  what  my  dear  Lady  Castleton  was  kind  enough  to 
save  me  from — all  owing  to  the  Ems  waters,  after  twenty 
years'  marriage !  Well,  my  young  friend,  and  how  are  all  at 
home  ?" 

As  when,  some  notable  performer  not  having  yet  arrived  be- 
hind the  scenes,  or  having  to  change  his  dress,  or  not  having 
yet  quite  recovered  an  unlucky  extra  tumbler  of  exciting  fluids 
— and  the  green  curtain  has  therefore  unduly  delayed  its  ascent 
— you  perceive  that  the  thorough-bass  in  the  orchestra  chari- 
tably devotes  himself  to  a  prelude  of  astonishing  prolixity,  call- 
ing in  Lodoiska  or  Der  Freischutz  to  beguile  the  time,  and  al- 
low the  procrastinating  histrio  leisure  sufhcient  to  draw  on  his 
flesh-coloured  pantaloons,  and  give  himself  the  proper  complex- 
ion for  a  Coriolanus  or  Macbeth — even  so  had  Sir  Sedley  made 
that  long  speech,  requiring  no  rejoinder,  till  he  saw  the  time 
had  arrived  when  he  could  artfully  close  with  the  flourish  of  a 
final  interrogative,  in  order  to  give  poor  Pisistratus  Caxton  all 
preparation  to  compose  himself  and  step  forward.  There  is 
certainly  something  of  exquisite  kindness,  and  thoughtful  be- 
nevolence, in  that  rarest  of  gifts,— -fine  breedinr/ ;  and  when 
now,  re-manned  and  resolute,  I  turned  round  and  saw  Sir  Sed- 
ley's  soft  blue  eye  shyly,  but  benignantly,  turned  to  me — while, 
with  a  grace  no  other  snuff-taker  ever  had  since  the  days  of 
Pope,  he  gently  proceeded  to  refresh  himself  by  a  pinch  of  the 
celebrated  Beaudesert  mixture — I  felt  my  heart  as  gratefully 
moved  towards  him  as  if  he  had  conferred  on  me  some  colos- 
sal obligation.  And  this  crowning  question — "And  how  are 
all  at  home  ?"  restored  me  entirely  to  my  self-possession,  and 
for  the  moment  distracted  the  bitter  current  of  my  thoughts. 

I  replied  by  a  brief  statement  of  my  father's  involvement, 
disguising  our  apprehensions  as  to  its  extent,  speaking  of  it 
rather  as  an  annoyance  than  a  possible  cause  of  ruin,  and  end- 
ed by  asking  Sir  Sedley  to  give  me  the  address  of  Trevanion's 
lawyer. 

The  good  baronet  listened  with  great  attention;  and  that 
quick  penetration  which  belongs  to  a  man  of  the  world  en- 
abled him  to  detect  that  I  had  smoothed  over  matters  more 
than  became  a  faithful  narrator. 

He  shook  his  head,  and  seating  himself  on  the  sofa,  motion- 


288  the  caxtons: 


ci 


I  me  t<»  come  i«»  his  side;  then,  Leaning  his  arm  over  my 
shoulder,  he  said  in  his  Beductive,  winning  way — 

"  We  t  wb  j  oung  fellows  should  understand  each  other  when 
we  talk  of  money  matters.  I  can  say  to  you  what  I  could  not 
s:iv  t<>  my  respectable  senior — by  three  years;  your  excellent 
lather.  Frankly,  then,  I  suspeel  this  is  a  bad  business.  I  know 
little  about  newspapers,  except  that  I  have  to  subscribe  to  one 
in  my  county,  which  costs  me  a  small  income  ;  but  I  know  that 
a  London  daily  paper  might  ruin  a  man  in  a  few  weeks.  And 
as  tor  shareholders,  my  dear  Caxton,  I  was  once  teased  into 
being  a  shareholder  in  a  canal  that  ran  through  my  property, 
and  ultimately  ran  off  with  £30,000  of  it !  The  other  share- 
holders were  all  drowned  in  the  canal,  like  Pharaoh  and  his 
host  in  the  lied  Sea.  But  your  father  is  a  great  scholar,  and 
must  not  be  plagued  with  such  matters.  I  owe  him  a  great 
deal.  He  was  very  kind  to  me  at  Cambridge,  and  gave  me 
the  taste  for  reading,  to  which  I  owe  the  pleasantest  hours  of 
my  life.  So,  when  you  and  the  lawyers  have  found  out  what 
the  extent  of  the  mischief  is,  you  and  I  must  see  how  we  can 
besl  settle  it.  What  the  deuce!  my  young  friend — I  have  no 
'encumbrances,'  as  the  servants,  with  great  want  of  politeness, 
call  wives  and  children.  And  I  am  not  a  miserable  great  land- 
ed millionaire,  like  that  poor  dear  Castleton,  who  owes  so  many 
duties  to  society  that  he  can't  spend  a  shilling,  except  in  a  grand 
way,  and  purely  to  benefit  the  public.  So  go,  my  boy,  to  Tre- 
vanion's  lawyer:  he  is  mine  too.  Clever  fellow  —  sharp  as  a 
needle,  Mr.  Pike,  in  Great  Ormond  Street  —  name  on  a  brass 
plate ;  and  when  he  has  settled  the  amount,  we  young  scape- 
graces will  help  each  other,  without  a  word  to  the  old  folks." 

What  good  it  does  to  a  man,  throughout  life,  to  meet  kind- 
ness and  generosity  like  this  in  his  youth  ! 

I  need  not  say  that  I  was  too  faithful  a  representative  of  my 
father's  scholarly  pride  and  susceptible  independence  of  spirit  to 
accept  this  proposal ;  and  probably  Sir  Sedley,  rich  and  liberal 
as  he  was,  did  not  dream  of  the  extent  to  which  his  proposal 
might  involve  him.  But  I  expressed  my  gratitude,  so  as  to 
please  and  move  this  last  relic  of  the  De  Coverlcys,  and  went 
from  liis  limine  straighl  to  .Mr.  Pike's  office,  with  a  little  note 
of  introduction  from  Sir  Sedley.  I  found  Mr.  Pike  exactly  the 
man  I  had  anticipated  from  Trevanion's  character  —  short, 
quick,  intelligent,  in  question  and  answer;  imposing,  and  some- 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  289 

what  domineering,  in  manner  —  not  overcrowded  with  busi- 
ness, but  with  enough  for  experience  and  respectability ;  nei- 
ther young  nor  old ;  neither  a  pedantic  machine  of  parchment, 
nor  a  jaunty  oft-hand  coxcomb  of  "West  End  manners. 

"  It  is  an  ugly  affair,"  said  he,  "  but  one  that  requires  man- 
agement. Leave  it  all  in  my  hands  for  three  days.  Don't  go 
near  Mr.  Tibbets,  nor  Mr.  Peck :  and  on  Saturday  next,  at  two 
o'clock,  if  you  will  call  here,  you  shall  know  my  opinion  of  the 
whole  matter."  With  that,  Mr.  Pike  glanced  at  the  clock,  and 
I  took  up  my  hat  and  went. 

There  is  no  place  more  delightful  than  a  great  capital,  if  you 
are  comfortably  settled  in  it — have  arranged  the  methodical 
disposal  of  your  time,  and  know  how  to  take  business  and  pleas- 
ure in  due  proportions.  But  a  flying  visit  to  a  great  capital, 
in  an  unsettled,  unsatisfactory  way — at  an  inn — an  inn  in  the 
City,  too  —  with  a  great  worrying  load  of  business  on  your 
mind,  of  which  you  are  to  hear  no  more  for  three  days ;  and 
an  aching,  jealous,  miserable  sorrow  at  the  heart,  such  as  I  had 
—  leaving  you  no  labour  to  pursue,  and  no  pleasure  that  you 
have  the  heart  to  share  in — oh,  a  great  capital  then  is  indeed 
forlorn,  wearisome,  and  oppressive !  It  is  the  Castle  of  Indo- 
lence, not  as  Thomson  built  it,  but  as  Beckford  drew  in  his 
Hall  of  Eblis — a  wandering  up  and  down,  to  and  fro — a  great 
awful  space,  with  your  hand  pressed  to  your  heart ;  and — oh 
for  a  rush  on  some  half-tame  horse,  through  the  measureless 
green  wastes  of  Australia  !  That  is  the  place  for  a  man  who 
has  no  home  in  the  Babel,  and  whose  hand  is  ever  pressing  to 
his  heart,  with  its  dull,  burning  pain. 

Mr.  Squills  decoyed  me  the  second  evening  into  one  of  the 
small  theatres ;  and  very  heartily  did  Mr.  Squills  enjoy  all  he 
saw,  and  all  he  heard.  And  while,  with  a  convulsive  effort  of 
the  jaws,  I  was  trying  to  laugh  too,  suddenly  in  one  of  the  act- 
ors, who  was  performing  the  worshipful  part  of  a  parish  bea- 
dle, I  recognized  a  face  that  I  had  seen  before.  Five  minutes 
afterwards  I  had  disappeared  from  the  side  of  Squills,  and  was 
amidst  that  strange  world — behind  the  scexes. 

My  beadle  was  much  too  busy  and  important  to  allow  me  a 
good  opportunity  to  accost  him  till  the  piece  was  over.  I  then 
seized  hold  of  him,  as  he  was  amicably  sharing  a  pot  of  porter 
with  a  gentleman  in  black  shorts  and  a  laced  waistcoat,  who 
was  to  play  the  part  of  a  broken-hearted  father  in  the  Domes- 

X 


290  tiik  CAXTONS: 

tic  Drama  in  Three  Acts,  that  would  conclude  the  amusements 
of  the  et  ening. 

"  Excuse  me,"  said  I  apologetically;  "but  as  the  Swan  per- 
tinently observes, — 'Should  auld  acquaintanee  be  forgot?'" 

k*  The  Swan,  sir  !"  cried  the  beadle  aghast — "  the  Swan  never 
demeaned  himself  by  such  d — d  broad  Scotch  as  that!" 

k-The  Tweed  has  its  Swans  as  well  as  the  Avon,  Mr.  Pea- 
cock/1 

"St — st — hush — hush — li — u — sh!"  whispered  the  beadle  in 
great  alarm,  and  eyeing  me,  with  savage  observation,  under 
his  corked  eyebrows.  Then,  taking  me  by  the  arm,  he  jerked 
me  away.  When  he  had  got  as  far  as  the  narrow  limits  of 
that  little  stage  would  allow,  Mr.  Peacock  said — 

"  Sir,  you  have  the  advantage  of  me  ;  I  don't  remember  you. 
Ah !  you  need  not  look  ! — by  gad,  sir,  I  am  not  to  be  bullied, 
— it  was  all  fair  play.  If  you  will  play  with  gentlemen,  sir, 
you  must  run  the  consequences." 

I  hastened  to  appease  the  worthy  man. 

"  Indeed,  Mr.  Peacock,  if  you  remember,  I  refused  to  play 
with  you ;  and,  so  far  from  wishing  to  offend  you,  I  now  come 
on  purpose  to  compliment  you  on  your  excellent  acting,  and  to 
inquire  if  you  have  heard  anything  lately  of  your  young  friend 
Mr.  Vivian." 

"  Vivian  ? — never  heard  the  name,  sir.  Vivian !  Pooh,  you 
are  trying  to  hoax  me ;  very  good !" 

"  I  assure  you,  Mr.  Peac — " 

"  St — st — How  the  deuce  did  you  know  that  I  was  once 
called  Peac — that  is,  people  called  me  Peac — A  friendly  nick- 
name, no  more — drop  it,  sir,  or  you  '  touch  me  with  noble 
anger !' " 

"  Well,  well ;  '  the  rose  by  any  name  will  smell  as  sweet,'  as 
the  Swan,  this  time  at  least,  judiciously  observes.  But,  Mr. 
Vivian,  too,  seems  to  have  other  names  at  his  disposal.  I 
mean  a  young,  dark,  handsome  man — or  rather  boy — with 
whom  I  met  you  in  company  by  the  roadside,  one  morning." 

"  O — h,"  said  Mr.  Peacock,  looking  much  relieved,  "  I  know 
whom  you  mean,  though  I  don't  remember  to  have  had  the 
pleasure  of  seeing  you  before.  No ;  I  have  not  heard  anything 
of  the  young  man  lately.  I  wish  I  did  know  something  of 
him.  He  was  a  'gentleman  in  my  own  May/  Sweet  Will 
has  hit  him  off  to  a  hair! — 


A    FAMILY    PICTUEE.  291 

'The  courtier's,  soldier's,  scholar's  eye,  tongue,  sword.' 
Such  a  hand  with  a  cue ! — you  should  have  seen  him  seek  the 
'  bubble  reputation  at  the  cannon's  mouth.'  I  may  say,"  con- 
tinued Mr.  Peacock,  emphatically,  "that  he  was  a  regular 
trump — trump !"  he  reiterated  with  a  start,  as  if  the  word  had 
stung  him — "  trump  !  he  was  a  brick  !" 

Then  fixing  his  eyes  on  me,  dropping  his  arms,  interlacing 
his  fingers  in  the  manner  recorded  of  Talma  in  the  celebrated 
"  Qu'en  dis-tu !"  he  resumed  in  a  hollow  voice,  slow  and  dis- 
tinct— 

"  When — saw — you — him, — young  m — m — a — n — nnn  ?" 
Finding  the  tables  thus  turned  on  myself,  and  not  willing  to 
give  Mr.  Peac —  any  clue  to  poor  Vivian  (who  thus  appeared, 
to  my  great  satisfaction,  to  have  dropped  an  acquaintance 
more  versatile  than  reputable),  I  contrived,  by  a  few  evasive 
sentences,  to  keep  Mr.  Peac — 's  curiosity  at  a  distance,  till  he 
was  summoned  in  haste  to  change  his  attire  for  the  domestic 
drama.     And  so  we  parted. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

I  hate  law  details  as  cordially  as  my  readers  can,  and  there- 
fore I  shall  content  myself  with  stating  that  Mr.  Pike's  man- 
agement, at  the  end,  not  of  three  days,  but  of  two  weeks,  was 
so  admirable,  that  Uncle  Jack  was  drawn  out  of  prison,  and 
my  father  extracted  from  all  his  liabilities,  by  a  sum  two-thirds 
less  than  was  startlingly  submitted  to  our  indignant  horror — 
and  that,  too,  in  a  manner  that  would  have  satisfied  the  con- 
science of  the  most  punctilious  formalist,  whose  contribution 
to  the  national  fund,  for  an  omitted  payment  to  the  Income 
Tax,  the  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer  ever  had  the  honour  to 
acknowledge.  Still,  the  sum  was  very  large  in  proportion  to 
my  poor  father's  income:  and  what  with  Jack's  debts,  the 
claims  of  the  Anti-Publisher  Society's  printer — including  the 
very  expensive  plates  that  had  been  so  lavishly  bespoken,  and 
in  great  part  completed,  for  the  History  of  Human  Error — 
and,  above  all,  the  liabilities  incurred  on  The  Capitalist  •  what 
with  the  plant,  as  Mr.  Peck  technically  phrased  a  great  upas- 
tree  of  a  total,  branching  out  into  types,  cases,  printing-presses, 
engines,  <fcc,  all  now  to  be  resold  at  a  third  of  their  value ; 


202  tin:  <  a\t<>.\ s  : 

what  with  advertisements  and  bills,  that  had  covered  all  the 
dead-walls  by  which  rubbish  might  be  shot,  throughout  the 
three  kingdoms;  what  with  the  dues  of  reporters,  and  salaries 
of  writers,  who  had  been  engaged  for  a  year  at  least  to  The 
Capitalist,  and.  whose  claims  survived  the  wretch  they  had 
killed  and  buried;  what,  in  short,  with  all  that  the  combined 
ingenuity  of  Uncle  Jack  and  Printer  Peck  could  supply  for 
the  utter  ruin  of  the  Oaxton  family — even  after  all  deductions, 
curtailments,  and  after  all  that  one  could  extract  in  the  way 
of  just  contribution  from  the  least  unsubstantial  of  those 
shadows  called  the  shareholders — my  father's  fortune  was  re- 
duced to  a  sum  of  between  seven  and  eight  thousand  pounds, 
which  being  placed  at  mortgage  at  four  per  cent.,  yielded  just 
£072  10s.  a-year — enough  for  my  father  to  live  upon,  but  not 
enough  to  afford  also  his  son  Pisistratus  the  advantages  of 
education  at  Trinity  College,  Cambridge.  The  blow  fell  rather 
upon  me  than  my  father,  and  my  young  shoulders  bore  it  with- 
out much  wincing. 

This  settled  to  our  universal  satisfaction,  I  went  to  pay  my 
farewell  visit  to  Sir  Sedley  Beaudesert.  He  had  made  much 
of  me  during  my  stay  in  London.  I  had  breakfasted  and 
dined  with  him  pretty  often ;  I  had  presented  Squills  to  him, 
who  had  no  sooner  set  eyes  upon  that  splendid  conformation, 
than  he  described  his  character  with  the  nicest  accuracy,  as 
the  necessary  consequence  of  such  a  development  for  the  rosy 
pleasures  of  life.  We  had  never  once  retouched  on  the  subject 
of  Fanny's  marriage,  and  both  of  us  tacitly  avoided  even  men- 
tioning the  Trevanions.  But  in  this  last  visit,  though  he  main- 
tained the  same  reserve  as  to  Fanny,  he  referred  without  scru- 
ple to  her  father. 

"Well,  my  young  Athenian,"  said  he,  after  congratulating 
me  on  the  result  of  the  negotiations,  and  endeavouring  again 
in  vain  to  bear  at  least  some  share  in  my  father's  losses — 
"well,  I  see  I  cannot  ] tress  this  farther;  but  at  least  I  can 
press  on  you  any  little  interesl  I  may  have,  in  obtaining  some 
a ]»]  .ointment  for  yourself,  in  one  of  the  public  offices.  Tre- 
vimion  could  of  course  be  more  useful,  but  I  can  understand 
thai  he  is  not  the  kind  of  man  you  would  like  to  apply  to." 

"Shall  T  own  to  you,  my  dear  Sir  Sedley,  that  1  have  no 
taste  for  official  employment?  I  am  too  fond  of  my  liberty. 
Since  I  have  been  at  my  uncle's  old  Tower,  I  account  for  half 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  293 

my  character  by  the  Borderer's  blood  that  is  in  me.  I  doubt 
if  I  am  meant  for  the  life  of  cities ;  and  I  have  old  floating  no- 
tions in  my  head,  that  will  serve  to  amuse  me  when  I  get 
home,  and  may  settle  mto  schemes.  And  now  to  change  the 
subject,  may  I  ask  what  sort  of  person  has  succeeded  me  as 
Mr.  Trevanion's  secretary  ?" 

"  Why,  he  has  got  a  broad-shouldered,  stooping  fellow,  in 
spectacles  and  cotton  stockings,  who  has  written  upon  'Kent,' 
I  believe — an  imaginative  treatise  in  his  case,  I  fear,  for  rent  is  a 
thing  he  could  never  have  received,  and  not  often  been  trusted 
to  pay.  However,  he  is  one  of  your  political  economists,  and 
wants  Trevanion  to  sell  his  pictures,  as  'unproductive  capital.' 
Less  mild  than  Pope's  Xareissa,  to  make  a  '  wash,'  he  would 
certainly  '  stew  a  child."  Besides  this  official  secretary,  Tre- 
vanion trusts,  however,  a  good  deal  to  a  clever,  good-looking 
young  gentleman,  who  is  a  great  favourite  with  him." 

"What  is  his  name?" 

"  His  name  ? — oh,  Gower ;  a  natural  son,  I  believe,  of  one  of 
the  Gower  family." 

Here  two  of  Sir  Sedley's  fellow  fine  gentlemen  lounged  in, 
and  my  visit  ended. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

"I  swear,"  cried  my  uncle,  "that  it  shall  be  so."  And 
with  a  big  frown,  and  a  truculent  air,  he  seized  the  fatal  in- 
strument. 

"  Indeed,  brother,  it  must  not,"  said  my  father,  laying  one 
pale,  scholarlike  hand  mildly  on  Captain  Roland's  brown,  bel- 
licose, and  bony  fist ;  and  with  the  other,  outstretched,  protect- 
ing the  menaced,  palpitating  victim. 

Xot  a  word  had  my  uncle  heard  of  our  losses,  until  they  had 
been  adjusted,  and  the  sum  paid ;  for  we  all  knew  that  the  old 
Tower  would  have  been  gone — sold  to  some  neighbouring 
squire  or  jobbing  attorney — at  the  first  impetuous  impulse  of 
Uncle  Roland's  affectionate  generosity.  Austin  endangered ! 
Austin  ruined  ! — he  would  never  have  rested  till  he  came,  cash 
in  hand,  to  his  deliverance.  Therefore,  I  say,  not  till  all  was 
settled  did  I  write  to  the  Captain,  and  tell  him  gaily  what  had 
chanced.     And,  however  light  I  made  of  our  misfortunes,  the 


294  THE  caxtons : 

Letter  brought  the  Captain  to  the  red  brick  house  the  same 
evening  on  which  I  myself  reached  It,  and  about  an  hour  Later. 
My  uncle  had  not  sold  the  Tower,  but  he  came  prepared  to 
carry  us  off  to  it  vi  et  armis.  Wo  must  live  with  him,  and  on 
him — lot  or  sell  the  brick  house,  and  put  out  the  remnant  of 
my  father's  income  to  nurse  and  accumulate.  And  it  was  on 
finding  my  father's  resistance  stubborn,  and  that  hitherto  he 
had  made  no  way,  that  my  uncle,  stepping  back  into  the  hall, 
in  which  he  had  left  his  carpet-bag,  &c,  returned  with  an  old 
oak  case,  and,  touching  a  spring  roller,  out  flew  the  Caxton 
pedigree. 

Out  it  flew — covering  all  the  table,  and  undulating,  Nile- 
like, till  it  had  spread  over  books,  papers,  my  mother's  work- 
box,  and  the  tea-service  (for  the  table  was  large  and  compend- 
ious, emblematic  of  its  owner's  mind),  and  then,  flowing  on  the 
carpet,  dragged  its  slow  length  along  till  it  was  stopped  by 
the  fonder. 

"  Now,"  said  my  uncle  solemnly,  "  there  never  have  been 
but  two  causes  of  difference  between  you  and  me,  Austin.  One 
is  over;  why  should  the  other  last?  Aha!  I  knowT  why  you 
hang  back :  you  think  that  we  may  quarrel  about  it !" 

"  About  what,  Roland  ?" 

"  About  it,  I  say — and  I'll  be  d — d  if  we  do !"  cried  my  un- 
cle, reddening.  "  And  I  have  been  thinking  a  great  deal  upon 
the  matter,  and  I  have  no  doubt  you  are  right.  So  I  brought 
the  old  parchment  with  me,  and  you  shall  see  me  fill  up  the 
blank,  just  as  you  would  have  it.  Now,  then,  you  will  come 
and  live  with  mo,  and  we  can  never  quarrel  any  more." 

Thus  saying,  Uncle  Roland  looked  round  for  pen  and  ink ; 
and,  having  found  them — not  without  difficulty,  for  they  had 
boon  submerged  under  the  overflow  of  the  pedigree — he  was 
about  to  fill  up  the  lacuna,  or  hiatus,  which  bad  given  rise  to 
such  memorable  controversy,  with  the  name  of  "William  Cax- 
ton, printer  in  the  Sanctuary,"  when  my  father,  slowly  recov- 
ering Ins  breath,  and  aware  of  his  brother's  purpose,  inter- 
vened. It  would  have  done  your  heart  good  to  hoar  them — 
so  completely,  in  the  inconsistency  of  human  nature,  had  they 
changed  sides  upon  the  question — my  father  now  all  for  Sir 
William  de  Caxton,  the  hero  of  Bos  worth;  my  ancle  all  for 

the  immortal  printer.  And  in  this  discussion  they  grew  ani- 
mated;  their  eyes  sparkled,  their  voiees  rose — Roland's  voice 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  295 

deep  and  thunderous,  Austin's  sharp  and  piercing.  Mr.  Squills 
stopped  his  ears.  Thus  it  arrived  at  that  point,  when  my  un- 
cle doggedly  came  to  the  end  of  all  argumentation — "  I  swear 
that  it  shall  be  so :"  and  my  father,  trying  the  last  resource 
of  pathos,  looked  pleadingly  into  Roland's  eyes,  and  said,  with 
a  tone  soft  as  mercy,  "  Indeed,  brother,  it  must  not."  Mean- 
while the  dry  parchment  crisped,  creaked,  and  trembled  in 
every  pore  of  its  yellow  skin. 

"But,"  said  I,  coming  in,  opportunely,  like  the  Horatian 
deity,  "  I  don't  see  that  either  of  you  gentlemen  has  a  right  so 
to  dispose  of  my  ancestry.  It  is  quite  clear  that  a  man  has  no 
possession  in  posterity.  Posterity  may  possess  him ;  but  deuce 
a  bit  will  he  ever  be  the  better  for  his  great  great-grandchil- 
dren !" 

Squills. — "Hear,  hear  !" 

Pisistkatus  (warming). — "But  a  man's  ancestry  is  a  posi- 
tive property  to  him.  How  much,  not  only  of  acres,  but  of 
his  constitution,  his  temper,  his  conduct,  character,  and  nature, 
he  may  inherit  from  some  progenitor  ten  times  removed !  Nay, 
without  that  progenitor,  would  he  ever  have  been  born — would 
a  Squills  ever  have  introduced  him  into  the  world,  or  a  nurse 
ever  have  carried  him  upo  kolpo .?" 

Squills. — "  Hear,  hear !" 

Pisisteatus  (with  dignified  emotion). — "  No  man,  therefore, 
has  a  right  to  rob  another  of  a  forefather,  with  a  stroke  of  his 
pen,  from  any  motives,  howsoever  amiable.  In  the  present 
instance,  you  will  say,  perhaps,  that  the  ancestor  in  question 
is  apocryphal — it  may  be  the  printer,  it  may  be  the  knight. 
Granted ;  but  here,  where  history  is  in  fault,  shall  a  mere  sen- 
timent decide  ?  While  both  are  doubtful,  my  imagination  ap- 
propriates both.  At  one  time  I  can  reverence  industry  and 
learning  in  the  printer ;  at  another,  valour  and  devotion  in  the 
knight.  This  kindly  doubt  gives  me  two  great  forefathers; 
and,  through  them,  two  trains  of  ideas  that  influence  my  con- 
duct under  different  circumstances.  I  will  not  permit  you, 
Captain  Roland,  to  rob  me  of  either  forefather — either  train 
of  idea.  Leave,  then,  this  sacred  void  unfilled,  unprofaned ; 
and  accept  this  compromise  of  chivalrous  courtesy — while  my 
father  lives  with  the.  Captain,  we  will  believe  in  the  print- 
er ;  when  away  from  the  Captain,  we  will  stand  firm  to  the 
knight." 


i  111.   i  \  \  i..\s  : 

>od!"  cried   Uncle  Roland,  as  I  paused,  a  little  out  of 
breath. 

M  And,"  said  my  mother  softly,  "I  do  think,  Austin,  there 
way  of  settling  the  matter  which  will  please  all  parties. 

It  is  quite  sad  to  think  that  poor  Roland,  and  dear  little 
Blanche,  should  be  all  alone  in  the  Tower;  and  I  am  sure  that 
we  should  be  much  happier  all  tog-ether." 

"There,"  cried  Roland  triumphantly.  "If  you  are  not  the 
most  obstinate,  hard-hearted,  unfeeling  brute  in  the  world — 
which  I  don't  take  you  to  be — brother  Austin,  after  that  really 
beautiful  Bpeech  of  your  wife's,  there  is  not  a  word  to  be  said 
further." 

"  But  we  have  not  yet  heard  Kitty  to  the  end,  Roland." 

"  I  beg  your  pardon  a  thousand  times,  ma'am — sister,"  said 
the  Captain,  bowing. 

"  Well,  I  was  going  to  add,"  said  my  mother,  "  that  we  will 
go  and  live  with  you,  Roland,  and  club  our  little  fortunes  to- 
gether. Blanche  and  I  will  take  care  of  the  house,  and  Ave 
shall  be  just  twice  as  rich  together  as  we  are  separately." 

"  Pretty  sort  of  hospitality  that !"  grunted  the  Captain.  "  I 
did  not  expect  you  to  throw  me  over  in  that  way.  No,  no ; 
you  must  lav  by  for  the  boy  there — what's  to  become  of  him?" 

"  But  we  shall  all  lay  by  for  him,"  said  my  mother,  simply ; 
"you  as  well  as  Austin.  We  shall  have  more  to  save,  if  we 
have  more  to  spend." 

"  Ah,  save  ! — that  is  easily  said :  there  would  be  a  pleasure 
in  saving,  then,"  said  the  Captain  mournfully. 

"And  what's  to  become  of  me?",  cried  Squills,  very  petu- 
lantly. "Am  I  to  be  left  here  in  my  old  age — not  a  rational 
soul  to  speak  to,  and  no  other  place  in  the  village  where  there's 
a  drop  of  decent  punch  to  be  had!  'A  plague  on  both  your 
houses !'  as  the  chap  said  at  the  theatre  the  other  night." 

"There's  room  for  a  doctor  in  our  neighbourhood,  Mr. 
Squills,"  said  the  Captain.  "The  gentleman  in  your  profes- 
sion who  does  for  us,  wants,  I  know,  to  sell  the  business." 

"  Humph,"  said  Squills — "  a  horribly  healthy  neighbourhood, 
I  suspect  I" 

"  Why,  it  has  that  misfortune,  Mr.  Squills ;  but  with  your 
help,"  said  my  uncle,  slyly,  "a  great  alteration  for  the  better 
may  be  effected  in  that  respect." 

Mr.  Squills  was  about  to  reply,  when — rin< 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  297 

ting  !  there  came  such  a  brisk,  impatient,  rnake-one's-self-at- 
home  kind  of  tintinabular  alarum  at  the  great  gate,  that  we 
all  started  up  and  looked  at  each  other  in  surprise.  Who 
could  it  possibly  be  ?  We  were  not  kept  long  in  suspense ; 
for  in  another  moment,  Uncle  Jack's  voice,  which  was  always 
very  clear  and  distinct,  pealed  through  the  hall ;  and  we  were 
still  staring  at  each  other  when  Mr.  Tibbets,  with  a  bran-new 
muffler  round  his  neck,  and  a  peculiarly  comfortable  greatcoat 
— best  double  Saxony,  equally  new — dashed  into  the  room, 
bringing  with  him  a  very  considerable  quantity  of  cold  air, 
which  he  hastened  to  thaw,  first  in  my  father's  arms,  next  in 
my  mother's.  He  then  made  a  rush  at  the  Captain,  who  en- 
sconced himself  behind  the  dumb  waiter  with  a  "Hern !  Mr. — 
sir — Jack — sir — hem,  hem !"  Failing  there,  Mr.  Tibbets  rub- 
bed off  the  remaining  frost  upon  his  double  Saxony  against 
your  humble  servant ;  patted  Squills  affectionately  on  the 
back,  and  then  proceeded  to  occupy  his  favourite  position  be- 
fore the  fire. 

"Took  you  by  surprise,  eh?"  said  Uncle  Jack,  impeding 
himself  by  the  hearth-rug.  "  But  no — not  by  surprise ;  you 
must  have  known  Jack's  heart :  you  at  least,  Austin  Caxton, 
who  know  everything — you  must  have  seen  that  it  overflowed 
with  the  tenderest  and  most  brotherly  emotions ;  that  once 
delivered  from  that  cursed  Fleet  (you  have  no  idea  what  a 
place  it  is,  sir),  I  could  not  rest,  night  or  day,  till  I  had  flown 
here — here,  to  the  dear  family  nest — poor  wounded  dove  that 
I  am!"  added  Uncle  Jack  pathetically,  and  taking  out  his 
pocket-handkerchief  from  the  double  Saxony,  which  he  had 
now  flung  over  my  father's  arm-chair. 

Not  a  word  replied  to  this  eloquent  address,  with  its  touch- 
ing peroration.  My  mother  hung  down  her  pretty  head,  and 
looked  ashamed.  My  uncle  retreated  quite  into  the  corner, 
and  drew  the  dumb  waiter  after  him,  so  as  to  establish  a  com- 
plete fortification.  Mr.  Squills  seized  the  pen  that  Roland  had 
thrown  down,  and  began  mending  it  furiously — that  is,  cutting 
it  into  slivers — thereby  denoting,  symbolically,  how  he  would 
like  to  do  with  Uncle  Jack,  could  he  once  get  him  safe  and 
snug  under  his  manipular  operations.  I  bent  over  the  pedi- 
gree, and  my  father  rubbed  his  spectacles. 

The  silence  would  have  been  appalling  to  another  man: 
nothing  appalled  Uncle  Jack. 

N2 


298  II I  r.  caxtons: 

Uncle  Jack  turned  to  the  fire,  and  wanned  first  one  foot, 
then  the  other.  This  comfortable  ceremony  performed,  he 
again  faced  the  company — and  resumed,  musingly,  and  as  if 
answering  some  imaginary  observations — 

"  Yes,  yes — you  are  right  there — and  a  deuced  unlucky 
speculation  it  proved  too.  But  I  was  overruled  by  that  fellow 
Peck.  Says  I  to  him — says  I — '  Capitalist !  pshaw — no  popu- 
lar interest  there — it  don't  address  the  great  public !  Very 
confined  class  the  capitalists ;  better  throw  ourselves  boldly 
on  the  people !  Yes,'  said  I,  '  call  it  the  -4ra££-Capitalist.'  By 
Jove !  sir,  we  should  have  carried  all  before  us !  but  I  was 
overruled.  The  Anti- Capitalist I — what  an  idea!  Address 
the  whole  reading  world,  there,  sir :  everybody  hates  the  cap- 
italist— everybody  would  have  his  neighbour's  money.  The 
Anti- Capitalist ! — sir,  we  should  have  gone  off,  in  the  manu- 
facturing towns,  like  wildfire.     But  what  could  I  do  ? — " 

"  John  Tibbets,"  said  my  father,  solemnly,  "  Capitalist  or 
Anti-Capitalist,  thou  hadst  a  right  to  follow  thine  own  bent  in 
either — but  always  provided  it  had  been  with  thine  own  mon- 
ey. Thou  seest  not  the  thing,  John  Tibbets,  in  the  right  point 
of  view ;  and  a  little  repentance  in  the  face  of  those  thou  hast 
wronged,  would  not  have  misbecome  thy  father's  son,  and  thy 
sifter's  brother!" 

Never  had  so  severe  a  rebuke  issued  from  the  mild  lips  of 
Austin  Caxton ;  and  I  raised  my  eyes  with  a  compassionate 
tli rill,  expecting  to  see  John  Tibbets  gradually  sink  and  dis- 
appear through  the  carpet. 

"  Repentance !"  cried  Uncle  Jack,  bounding  up,  as  if  he  had 
been  shot.  "  And  do  you  think  I  have  a  heart  of  stone,  of 
pummystone ! — do  you  think  I  don't  repent  ?  I  have  done 
nothing  but  repent — I  shall  repent  to  my  dying  day." 

"  Then  there  is  no  more  to  be  said,  Jack,"  cried  my  father, 
softening,  and  holding  out  his  hand. 

"Yes!"  cried  Mr. Tibbets,  seizing  the  hand,  and  pressing  it 
to  the  heart  he  had  thus  defended  from  the  suspicion  of  being 
pummy,  —  "yes,  —  that  I  should  have  trusted  that  dunder- 
headed,  rascally,  curmudgeon  Peck:  that  I  should  have  let 
him  call  it  7V/'  Capitalist,  despite  all  my  convictions,  when 
the  J////—" 

"  Pshaw  I"  interrupted  my  father,  drawing  away  his  hand. 

"John,"  said  my  mother,  gravely,  and  with  tears  in  her 


A    FAMILY   PICTURE.  299 

voice,  "you  forget  who  delivered  you  from  prison, — you  for- 
get whom  you  have  nearly  consigned  to  prison  yourself — you 
forg-" 

"  Hush,  hush  !"  said  my  father,  "  this  will  never  do ;  and  it 
is  you  who  forget,  my  dear,  the  obligations  I  owe  to  Jack. 
He  has  reduced  my  fortune  one-half,  it  is  true ;  but  I  verily 
think  he  has  made  the  three  hearts,  in  which  lie  my  real 
treasures,  twice  as  large  as  they  were  before.  Pisistratus,  my 
boy,  ring  the  bell." 

"My  dear  Kitty,"  cried  Jack,  whimperingly,  and  stealing 
up  to  my  mother,  "  don't  be  so  hard  on  me ;  I  thought  to 
make  all  your  fortunes — I  did  indeed." 

Here  the  servant  entered. 

"  See  that  Mr.  Tibbets'  things  are  taken  up  to  his  room,  and 
that  there  is  a  good  fire,"  said  my  father. 

"  And,"  continued  Jack,  loftily,  "  I  will  make  all  your  for- 
tunes yet.     I  have  it  here/"  and  he  struck  his  head. 

"Stay  a  moment!"  said  my  father  to  the  servant,  who  had 
got  back  to  the  door.  "  Stay  a  moment,"  said  my  father,  look- 
ing extremely  frightened ;  "  perhaps  Mr.  Tibbets  may  prefer 
the  inn !" 

"Austin,"  said  Uncle  Jack,  with  emotion,  "if  I  were  a  dog, 
with  no  home  but  a  dog-kennel,  and  you  came  to  me  for  shel- 
ter, I  would  turn  out — to  give  you  the  best  of  the  straw." 

My  father  was  thoroughly  melted  this  time. 

"  Primmins  will  be  sure  to  see  everything  is  made  comfort- 
able for  Mr.  Tibbets,"  said  he,  waving  his  hand  to  the  servant. 
"  Something  nice  for  supper,  Kitty,  my  dear — and  the  largest 
punch-bowl.     You  like  punch,  Jack  ?" 

"  Punch,  Austin !"  said  Uncle  Jack,  putting  his  handkerchief 
to  his  eyes. 

The  Captain  pushed  aside  the  dumb  waiter,  strode  across 
the  room,  and  shook  hands  with  Uncle  Jack;  my  mother 
buried  her  face  in  her  apron,  and  fairly  ran  off;  and  Squills 
said  in  my  ear,  "  It  all  comes  of  the  biliary  secretions.  No- 
body could  account  for  this,  who  did  not  know  the  peculiarly 
fine  organization  of  your  father's — liver!" 


PAET  TWELFTH. 

CHAPTER  I. 

The  Hegira  is  completed — we  have  all  taken  roost  in  the 
old  tower.  My  father's  books  have  arrived  by  the  wagon, 
and  have  settled  themselves  quietly  in  their  new  abode — filling 
up  the  apartment  dedicated  to  their  owner,  including  the  bed- 
chamber and  two  lobbies.  The  duck  also  has  arrived,  under 
wing  of  Mrs.  Primmins,  and  has  reconciled  herself  to  the  old 
stewpond,  by  the  side  of  which  my  father  lias  found  a  walk 
that  compensates  for  the  peach-wall — especially  as  he  has  made 
acquaintance  with  sundry  respectable  carps,  who  permit  him 
to  feed  them  after  he  has  fed  the  duck — a  privilege  of  which 
(since,  if  any  one  else  approaches,  the  carps  are  off  in  an  in- 
stant) my  father  is  naturally  vain.  All  privileges  are  valuable 
in  proportion  to  the  exclusiveness  of  their  enjoyment. 

Now,  from  the  moment  the  first  carp  had  eaten  the  bread 
my  father  threw  to  it,  Mr.  Caxton  had  mentally  resolved  that 
a  race  so  confiding  should  never  be  sacrificed  to  Ceres  and 
Primmins.  But  all  the  fishes  on  my  uncle's  property  were  un- 
der the  special  care  of  that  Proteus  Bolt — and  Bolt  was  not  a 
man  likely  to  suffer  the  carps  to  earn  their  bread  without  con- 
1  ributing  their  full  share  to  the  wants  of  the  community.  But, 
like  master,  like  man !  Bolt  was  an  aristocrat  fit  to  be  hung 
a  ht  lanteme.  He  out-Rolanded  Roland  in  the  respect  he  en- 
tertained for  sounding  names  and  old  families;  and  by  that 
bait  in}'  father  caught  him  with  such  skill,  that  you  might  see 
that,  if  Austin  Caxton  had  been  an  angler  of  fishes,  he  could 
have  filled  his  basket  full  any  day,  shine  or  rain. 

"  You  observe,  Bolt,"  said  my  father,  beginning  artfully, 
"that  those  fishes,  dull  as  you  may  think  them,  are  creatures 
capable  of  a  syllogism;  and  if  they  saw  that,  in  proportion  to 
their  civility  to  me,  they  were  depopulated  by  you,  they  would 
put  two  and  two  together,  and  renounce  my  acquaintance." 

"Is  that  what  you  call  being  silly  Jems,  sir?"  said  Bolt: 
"faith,  there  is  many  a  good  Christian  not  half  so  wise!" 

"Man,"  answered  my  father,  thoughtfully,  "  is  an  animal  less 


THE    CAXTOXS.  301 

syllogistical,  or  more  silly-Jemical,  than  many  creatures  popu- 
larly esteemed  his  inferiors.  Yes,  let  but  one  of  those  Cypri- 
nidse,  with  his  fine  sense  of  logic,  see  that,  if  his  fellow-fishes 
eat  bread,  they  are  suddenly  jerked  out  of  their  element,  and 
vanish  for  ever ;  and  though  you  broke  a  quartern  loaf  into 
crumbs,  he  would  snap  his  tail  at  you  with  enlightened  con- 
tempt. If,"  said  my  father,  soliloquizing,  "  I  had  been  as  syl- 
logistic as  those  scaly  logicians,  I  should  never  have  swallowed 
that  hook,  which — hum!  there — least  said  soonest  mended. 
But,  Mr.  Bolt,  to  return  to  the  Cyprinidse." 

"  What's  the  hard  name  you  call  them  'ere  carp,  your  hon- 
our ?"  asked  Bolt. 

"  CyprinidsB,  a  family  of  the  section  Malacoptergii  Abdom- 
inales,"  replied  Mr.  Caxton ;  "  their  teeth  are  generally  confined 
to  the  Pharyngeans,  and  their  branchiostegous  rays  are  but 
few — marks  of  distinction  from  fishes  vulgar  and  voracious." 

"  Sir,"  said  Bolt,  glancing  to  the  stewpond,  "  if  I  had  known 
they  had  been  a  family  of  such  importance,  I  am  sure  I  should 
have  treated  them  with  more  respect." 

"  They  are  a  very  old  family,  Bolt,  and  have  been  settled  in 
England  since  the  fourteenth  century.  A  younger  branch  of 
the  family  has  established  itself  in  a  pond  in  the  gardens  of 
PeterhoiF  (the  celebrated  palace  of  Peter  the  Great,  Bolt — an 
emperor  highly  respected  by  my  brother,  for  he  killed  a  great 
many  people  very  gloriously  in  battle,  besides  those  whom  he 
sabred  for  his  own  private  amusement).  And  there  is  an  offi- 
cer or  servant  of  the  Imperial  household,  whose  task  it  is  to 
summon  those  Russian  Cyprinidse  to  dinner,  by  ringing  a  bell, 
shortly  after  which  you  may  see  the  emperor  and  empress, 
with  all  their  waiting  ladies  and  gentlemen,  coming  down  in 
their  carriages  to  see  the  Cyprinida?  eat  in  state.  So  you  per- 
ceive, Bolt,  that  it  would  be  a  republican,  Jacobinical  proceed- 
ing to  stew  members  of  a  family  so  intimately  associated  with 
royalty." 

"  Dear  me,  sir,"  said  Bolt,  "  I  am  very  glad  you  told  me.  I 
ought  to  have  known  they  were  genteel  fish,  they  are  so  mighty 
shy — all  your  real  quality  are." 

My  father  smiled,  and  rubbed  his  hands  gently;  he  had  car- 
ried his  point,  and  henceforth  the  Cyprinidae  of  the  section 
Malacoptergii  Abdominales  were  as  sacred  in  Bolt's  eyes  as 
cats  and  ichneumons  were  in  those  of  a  priest  in  Thebes. 


302  THE  <  axtons: 

My  poor  father!  with  what  true  and  unostentatious  philos- 
ophy thou  didsl  accommodate  thyself  to  the  greatest  change 
thy  quiet,  harmless  life  had  known,  since  it  had  passed  out  of 
tin-  brief  burning  cycle  of  the  passions.  Lost  was  the  home 
endeared  to  thee  by  so  many  noiseless  victories  of  the  mind — 
so  many  mute  histories  of  the  heart  —  for  only  the  scholar 
knoweth  how  deep  a  charm  lies  in  monotony,  in  the  old  asso- 
ciations, the  old  ways,  and  habitual  clockwork  of  peaceful  time. 
Yet,  the  home  may  be  replaced — thy  heart  built  its  home  round 
itself  everywhere  —  and  the  old  Tower  might  supply  the  loss 
of  the  brick  house,  and  the  walk  by  the  stewpond  become  as 
dear  as  the  haunts  by  the  sunny  peach-wall.  But  what  shall 
replace  to  thee  the  bright  dream  of  thine  innocent  ambition, — 
that  angel-wing  which  had  glittered  across  thy  manhood,  in 
the  hour  between  its  noon  and  its  setting  ?  What  replace  to 
thee  the  Magnum  Opus  —  the  Great  Book!  —  fair  and  broad- 
spreading  tree  —  lone  amidst  the  sameness  of  the  landscape  — 
now  plucked  up  by  the  roots.  The  oxygen  was  subtracted 
from  the  air  of  thy  life.  For  be  it  known  to  you,  O  my  com- 
passionate readers,  that  with  the  death  of  the  Anti-Publisher 
Society  the  blood-streams  of  the  Great  Book  stood  still — its 
pulse  was  arrested — its  full  heart  beat  no  more.  Three  thou- 
sand copies  of  the  first  seven  sheets  in  quarto,  with  sundry  unfin- 
ished plates,  anatomical,  architectural,  and  graphic,  depicting 
various  developments  of  the  human  skull  (that  temple  of  Human 
Error),  from  the  Hottentot  to  the  Greek;  sketches  of  ancient 
buildings,  Cyclopean  and  Pelasgic ;  Pyramids,  and  Pur-tors,  all 
signs  of  races  whose  handwriting  was  on  their  walls  ;  land- 
scapes to  display  the  influence  of  Nature  upon  the  customs, 
creeds,  and  philosophy  of  men — here  showing  how  the  broad 
Chaldean  wastes  led  to  the  contemplation  of  the  stars;  and  il- 
lustrations of  the  Zodiac,  in  elucidation  of  the  mysteries  of 
symbol  Avorship ;  fantastic  vagaries  of  earth  fresh  from  the 
Deluge,  tending  to  impress  on  early  superstition  the  awful 
Bense  of  the  rude  powers  of  Nature;  views  of  the  rocky  defiles 
of  Laconia  ;  Sparta, neighboured  by  the  "silent  Amyclay'  ex- 
plaining, as  it  were  geographically,  the  iron  customs  of  the 
warrior  colony  (arch  Tories,  amidst  the  shift  and  roar  of  Hel- 
lenic democracies),  contrasted  by  the  seas,  and  coasts,  and 
creeks  of  Athens  and  Ionia,  tempting  to  adventure,  commerce, 
and  change.     Yea,  my  father,  in  his  suggestions  to  the  artist 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  303 

of  those  few  imperfect  plates,  had  thrown  as  much  light  on  the 
infancy  of  earth  and  its  tribes  as  by  the  "  shining  words"  that 
flowed  from  his  calm,  starry  knowledge  !  Plates  and  copies, 
all  rested  now  in  peace  and  dust — "  housed  with  darkness  and 
with  death,"  on  the  sepulchral  shelves  of  the  lobby  to  which 
they  were  consigned — rays  intercepted — worlds  incompleted. 
The  Prometheus  was  bound,  and  the  fire  he  had  stolen  from 
heaven  lay  imbedded  in  the  flints  of  his  rock.  For  so  costly 
was  the  mould  in  which  Uncle  Jack  and  the  Anti-Publisher 
Society  had  contrived  to  cast  this  Exposition  of  Human  Error, 
that  every  bookseller  shyed  at  its  very  sight,  as  an  owl  blinks 
at  daylight,  or  human  error  at  truth.  In  vain  Squills  and  I, 
before  we  left  London,  had  carried  a  gigantic  specimen  of  the 
Magnum  Opus  into  the  back-parlours  of  firms  the  most  opu- 
lent and  adventurous.  Publisher  after  publisher  started,  as  if 
we  had  held  a  blunderbuss  to  his  ear.  All  Paternoster  Row 
uttered  a  "  Lord  deliver  us  !"  Human  Error  found  no  man  so 
egregiously  its  victim  as  to  complete  those  two  quartos,  with 
the  prospect  of  two  others,  at  his  own  expense.  Now,  I  had 
earnestly  hoped  that  my  father,  for  the  sake  of  mankind,  would 
be  persuaded  to  risk  some  portion  —  and  that,  I  own,  not  a 
small  one — of  his  remaining  capital  on  the  conclusion  of  an  un- 
dertaking so  elaborately  begun.  But  there  my  father  was  ob- 
durate. No -big  words  about  mankind,  and  the  advantage  to 
unborn  generations,  could  stir  him  an  inch.  "  Stuff!"  said  Mr. 
Caxton,  peevishly.  "  A  man's  duties  to  mankind  and  posterity 
begin  with  his  own  son ;  and  having  wasted  half  your  patri- 
mony, I  will  not  take  another  huge  slice  out  of  the  poor  re- 
mainder to  gratify  my  vanity,  for  that  is  the  plain  truth  of  it. 
Man  must  atone  for  sin  by  expiation.  By  the  book  I  have  sin- 
ned, and  the  book  must  expiate  it.  Pile  the  sheets  up  in  the 
lobby,  so  that  at  least  one  man  may  be  wiser  and  humbler  by 
the  sight  of  Human  Error,  every  time  he  walks  by  so  stupen- 
dous a  monument  of  it." 

Verily,  I  know  not  how  my  father  could  bear  to  look  at 
those  dumb  fragments  of  himself — strata  of  the  Caxtonian 
conformation  lying  layer  upon  layer,  as  if  packed  up  and  dis- 
posed for  the  inquisitive  genius  of  some  moral  Murchison  or 
Mantell.  But,  for  my  part,  I  never  glanced  at  their  repose  in 
the  dark  lobby  without  thinking,  "  Courage,  Pisistratus !  cour- 
age !  there's  something  worth  living  for ;  work  hard,  grow 
rich,  and  the  G^reat  book  shall  come  out  at  last." 


304  THE   CAXTONS  : 

Meanwhile,  I  wandered  over  the  country,  and  made  acquaint- 
ance with  tin-  farmers,  and  with  Trevanion's  steward — an  able 
man,  and  a  great  agriculturist — and  I  learned  from  them  a 
better  notion  of  the  nature  of  my  uncle's  domains.  Those  do- 
mains covered  an  immense  acreage,  which,  save  a  small  farm, 
was  of  no  value  at  present.  But  land  of  the  same  sort  had 
been  lately  redeemed  by  a  simple  kind  of  draining,  now  well 
known  in  Cumberland;  and,  with  capital,  Roland's  barren 
moors  might  become  a  noble  property.  But  capital,  where 
was  that  to  come  from  ?  Nature  gives  us  all  except  the  means 
to  turn  her  into  marketable  account.  As  old  Plautus  saith  so 
wittily,  "  Day,  night,  water,  sun,  and  moon,  are  to  be  had  grat- 
is; for  everything  else — down  with  your  dust!" 


CHAPTER  II. 

Nothing  has  been  heard  of  Uncle  Jack.  Before  we  left  the 
brick  house,  the  Captain  gave  him  an  invitation  to  the  Tower 
— more,  I  suspect,  out  of  compliment  to  my  mother,  than  from 
the  unbidden  impulse  of  his  own  inclinations.  But  Mr.  Tib- 
bets  politely  declined  it.  During  his  stay  at  the  brick  house, 
lie  had  received  and  written  a  vast  number  of  letters — some 
of  those  he  received,  indeed,  were  left  at  the  village  post-office, 
under  the  alphabetical  addresses  of  A  B  or  X  Y;  for  no  mis- 
fortune ever  paralyzed  the  energies  of  Uncle  Jack.  In  the 
winter  of  adversity  he  vanished,  it  is  true ;  but  even  in  vanish- 
ing, he  vegetated  still.  He  resembled  those  algw,  termed  the 
Prolococcus  nivales,  which  give  a  rose-colour  to  the  Polar 
snows  that  conceal  them,  and  flourish  unsuspected  amidst  the 
general  dissolution  of  Nature.  Uncle  Jack,  then,  was  as  lively 
and  sanguine  as  ever — though  he  began  to  let  fall  vague  hints 
of  intentions  to  abandon  the  general  cause  of  his  fellow-crea- 
tures, and  to  set  up  business  henceforth  purely  on  his  own  ac- 
count; wherewith  my  lather — to  the  great  shock  of  my  belief 
in  his  philanthropy — expressed  himself  much  pleased.  And  I 
strongly  suspect  that,  when  Uncle  Jack  wrapped  himself  up  in 
his  new  double  Saxony,  ami  went  off  at  last,  he  carried  with 
him  something  more  than  my  lather's  good  wishes  in  aid  of 
lii>  conversion  t<>  egotistical  philosophy. 

"That  man  will  do  yet,"  said  my  father,  as  the  last  glimpse 


A   FAMILY   PICTUKE.  305 

was  caught  of  Uncle  Jack  standing  up  on  the  stage-coach  box, 
beside  the  driver,  partly  to  wave  his  hand  to  us  as  we  stood  at 
the  gate,  and  partly  to  array  himself  more  commodiously  in  a 
box-coat  with  six  capes,  which  the  coachman  had  lent  him. 

"  Do  you  think  so,  sir  ?"  said  I,  doubtfully.  "  May  I  ask 
why?" 

Me.  Caxton. — "  On  the  cat  principle — that  he  tumbles  so 
lightly.  You  may  throw  him  down  from  St.  Paul's,  and  the 
next  time  you  see  him  he  will  be  scrambling  a-top  of  the 
Monument." 

Pisisteatus. — "  But  a  cat  the  most  viparious  is  limited  to 
nine  lives ;  and  Uncle  Jack  must  be  now  far  gone  in  his 
eighth." 

Me.  Caxtox  (not  heeding  that  answer,  for  he  has  got  his 
hand  in  his  waistcoat). — "  The  earth,  according  to  Apuleius,  in 
his  Treatise  on  the  Philosophy  of  Plato,  was  produced  from 
right-angled  triangles ;  but  tire  and  air  from  the  scalene  trian- 
gle— the  angles  of  which,  I  need  not  say,  are  very  different  from 
those  of  a  right-angled  triangle.  Now  I  think  there  are  people 
in  the  world  of  whom  one  can  only  judge  rightly  according  to 
those  mathematical  principles  applied  to  their  original  con- 
struction :  for  if  air  or  fire  predominates  in  our  natures,  we  are 
scalene  triangles ; — if  earth,  right-angled.  Xow,  as  air  is  so 
notably  manifested  in  Jack's  conformation,  he  is,  nolens  volcns, 
produced  in  conformity  with  his  preponderating  element.  He 
is  a  scalene  triangle,  and  must  be  judged,  accordingly,  upon  ir- 
regular, lop-sided  principles ;  whereas  you  and  I,  commonplace 
mortals,  are  produced,  like  the  earth,  which  is  our  preponder- 
ating element,  with  our  triangles  all  right-angled,  comfortable 
and  complete  ;  for  which  blessing  let  us  thank  Providence,  and 
be  charitable  to  those  who  are  necessarily  windy  and  gaseous, 
from  that  unlucky  scalene  triangle  upon  which  they  have  had 
the  misfortune  to  be  constructed,  and  which,  you  perceive,  is 
quite  at  variance  with  the  mathematical  constitution  of  the 
earth  !" 

Pisisteatus. — "  Sir,  I  am  very  happy  to  hear  so  simple,  easy, 
and  intelligible  an  explanation  of  Uncle  Jack's  peculiarities ; 
and  I  only  hope  that,  for  the  future,  the  sides  of  his  scalene 
triangle  may  never  be  produced  to  our  rectangular  conforma- 
tions." 

Me.  Caxtox  (descending  from  his  stilts  with  an  air  as  mild- 


30(>  Tin:  CAXTONS  : 

ly  reproachful  as  if  I  had  been  cavilling  at  the  virtues  of  Soc- 
rates).— "You  don't  do  your  uncle  justice,  Pisistratus;  he  is 
a  very  clever  man;  and  I  am  sure  that,  in  spite  of  his  scalene 
misfortune,  he  would  be  an  honest  one — that  is  (added  Mr. 
Caxton,  correcting  himself),  not  romantically  or  heroically 
honest,  but  honest  as  men  go — if  he  could  but  keep  his  head 
long  enough  above  water ;  but,  you  see,  when  the  best  man  in 
the  world  is  engaged  in  the  process  of  sinking,  he  catches  hold 
of  whatever  comes  in  his  way,  and  drowns  the  very  friend  who 
is  swimming  to  save  him." 

Pisistratus. — "Perfectly  true,  sir;  but  Uncle  Jack  makes 
it  his  business  to  be  always  sinking !" 

Mr.  Caxtox  (with  naivete). — "And  how  could  it  be  other- 
wise, when  he  has  been  carrying  all  his  fellow-creatures  in  his 
breeches  pockets !  Now  he  has  got  rid  of  that  dead  weight, 
I  should  not  be  surprised  if  he  swam  like  a  cork !" 

Pisistratus  (who,  since  the  Capitalist,  has  become  a  strong 
Anti-Jackian). — "  But  if,  sir,  you  really  think  Uncle  Jack's  love 
for  his  fellow-creatures  is  genuine,  that  is  surely  not  the  worst 
part  of  him." 

3In.  Caxtox. — "  O  literal  ratiocinator,  and  dull  to  the  true 
logic  of  Attic  irony !  can't  you  comprehend  that  an  affection 
may  be  genuine  as  felt  by  the  man,  yet  its  nature  be  spurious 
in  relation  to  others  ?  A  man  may  genuinely  believe  he  loves 
his  fellow-creatures,  when  he  roasts  them  like  Torquemada,  or 
guillotines  them  like  St.  Just !  Happily  Jack's  scalene  triangle, 
being  more  produced  from  air  than  from  fire,  does  not  give  to 
his  philanthropy  the  inflammatory  character  which  distinguish- 
es the  benevolence  cf  inquisitors  and  revolutionists.  The  phi- 
lanthropy, therefore,  takes  a  more  flatulent  and  innocent  form, 
and  expends  iis  strength  in  mounting  paper  balloons,  out  of 
which  Jack  pitches  himself,  with  all  the  fellow-creatures  he 
can  coax:  into  sailing  with  him.  No  doubt  Uncle  Jack's  phi- 
lanthropy is  sincere,  when  lie  cuts  the  string  and  soars  up  out 
of  sighl  ;  but  the  sincerity  will  not  much  mend  their  bruises 
when  himself  and  fellow-creatures  come  tumbling  down  neck 
and  heels.  It  must  be  a  very  wide  heart  that  can  take  in  all 
mankind — and  of  a  very  strong  fibre  to  bear  so  much  stretch- 
ing. Such  hearts  there  are,  Eeaven  be  thanked  I — and  all  praise 
to  them!  .lack's  is  not  of  that  quality.  He  is  a  scalene  tri- 
angle.    He  is  not  a  circle!     And  yet,  if  he  would  but  let  it 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  307 

rest,  it  is  a  good  heart — a  very  good  heart  (continued  my  fa- 
ther, warming  into  a  tenderness  quite  infantine,  all  things  con- 
sidered). Poor  Jack !  that  was  prettily  said  of  hirn — '  That  if 
he  were  a  dog,  and  he  had  no  home  but  a  dog-kennel,  he  would 
turn  out  to  give  me  the  best  of  the  straw !'  Poor  brother 
Jack !" 

So  the  discussion  was  dropped  ;  and,  in  the  meanwhile,  Uncle 
Jack,  like  the  short-faced  gentleman  in  the  Spectator,  "  dis- 
tinguished himself  by  a  profound  silence." 


CHAPTER  III. 

Blanche  has  contrived  to  associate  herself,  if  not  with  my 
more  active  diversions — in  running  over  the  country,  and  mak- 
ing friends  with  the  farmers — still  in  all  my  more  leisurely  and 
domestic  pursuits.  There  is  about  her  a  silent  charm  that  it 
is  very  hard  to  define,  but  it  seems  to  rise  from  a  kind  of  in- 
nate sympathy  with  the  moods  and  humours  of  those  she  loves. 
If  one  is  gay,  there  is  a  cheerful  ring  in  her  silver  laugh  that 
seems  gladness  itself;  if  one  is  sad,  and  creeps  away  into  a  cor- 
ner to  bury  one's  head  in  one's  hand,  and  muse — by-and-by, 
and  just  at  the  right  moment,  when  one  has  mused  one's  fill, 
and  the  heart  wants  something  to  refresh  and  restore  it,  one 
feels  two  innocent  arms  round  one's  neck — looks  up — and  lo ! 
Blanche's  soft  eyes,  full  of  wistful  compassionate  kindness; 
though  she  has  the  tact  not  to  question — it  is  enough  for  her 
to  sorrow  with  your  sorrow — she  cares  not  to  know  more.  A 
strange  child! — fearless,  and  yet  seemingly  fond  of  things  that 
inspire  children  with  fear;  fond  of  tales  of  fay,  sprite,  and 
ghost,  which  Mrs.  Primmins  draws  fresh  and  new  fom  her 
memory,  as  a  conjurer  draws  pancakes  hot  and  hot  from  a  hat. 
And  yet  so  sure  is  Blanche  of  her  own  innocence,  that  they 
never  trouble  her  dreams  in  her  lone  little  room,  full  of  calig- 
inous  corners  and  nooks,  with  the  winds  moaning  round  the 
desolate  ruins,  and  the  casements  rattling  hoarse  in  the  dun- 
geon-like wall.  She  would  have  no  dread  to  walk  through  the 
ghostly  keep  in  the  dark,  or  cross  the  churchyard,  what  time, 

"By  the  moon's  doubtful  and  malignant  light,"' 
the  grave-stones  look  so  spectral,  and  the  shade  from  the  yew- 
trees  lies  so  still  on  the  sward.     When  the  brows  of  Roland 


308  THE   I   UCTONS  : 

gloomiest,  and  the  compression  of  his  lips  makes  sorrow 
look  Bternest,  be  Bure  thai  Blanche  is  couched  at  his  feet,  wait- 
ing the  moment  when,  with  some  heavy  sigh,  the  muscles  re- 
lax, and  she  is  sure  of  the  smile  if  she  climbs  to  his  knee.  It 
i-  pretty  to  chance  on  her  gliding  up  broken  turret-stairs,  or 
standing  hushed  in  the  recess  of  shattered  casements,  and  you 
wonder  what  thoughts  of  vague  awe  and  solemn  pleasure  can 
be  at  work  under  that  still  little  brow. 

She  has  a  quick  comprehension  of  all  that  is  taught  to  her; 
she  already  tasks  to  the  full  my  mother's  educational  arts.  My 
father  has  had  to  rummage  his  library  for  books,  to  feed  (or 
extinguish)  her  desire  for  ''farther  information ;"  and  has  prom- 
ised lessons  in  French  and  Italian — at  some  golden  time  in  the 
shadowy  "  By-and-by" — which  are  received  so  gratefully  that 
one  might  think  Blanche  mistook  Telemaque  and  JVbvelle  Mo- 
rall  for  baby-houses  and  dolls.  Heaven  send  her  through 
French  and  Italian  with  better  success  than  attended  Mr.  Cax- 
tons  lessons  in  Greek  to  Pisistratus !  She  has  an  ear  for  mu- 
sic, which  my  mother,  who  is  no  bad  judge,  declares  to  be  ex- 
quisite. Luckily  there  is  an  old  Italian  settled  in  a  town  ten 
miles  off,  who  is  said  to  be  an  excellent  music-master,  and  who 
comes  the  round  of  the  neighbouring  squirearchy  twice  a-week. 
I  have  taught  her  to  draw — an  accomplishment  in  which  I  am 
not  without  skill — and  she  has  already  taken  a  sketch  from  na- 
ture, which,  barring  the  perspective,  is  not  so  amiss ;  indeed, 
she  has  caught  the  notion  of  "  idealizing"  (which  promises  fu- 
ture originality)  from  her  own  natural  instincts,  and  given  to 
the  old  witch-elm  that  hangs  over  the  stream,  just  the  bow 
that  it  wanted  to  dip  into  the  water,  and  soften  off  the  hard 
lines.  My  only  fear  is,  that  Blanche  should  become  too  dreamy 
and  thoughtful.  Poor  child,  she  has  no  one  to  play  with !  So 
I  look  out,  and  get  her  a  dog — frisky  and  young,  who  abhors 
sedentary  occupations — a  spaniel,  small  and  coal-black,  with 
ears  sweeping  the  ground.  I  baptize  him  "  Juba,"  in  honour 
of  Addison's  Cato,  and  in  consideration  of  his  sable  curls  and 
Mauritanian  complexion.  Blanche  does  not  seem  so  eerie  and 
elf-like  while  gliding  through  the  ruins,  when  Juba  barks  by 
her  side,  and  scares  the  birds  from  the  ivy. 

One  day  I  had  been  pacing  to  and  fro  the  hall,  which  was 
deserted;  and  the  sight  of  the  armour  and  portraits — dumb 
evidences  of  the  active  and  adventurous  lives  of  the  old  inhab- 


A    FAMILY   PICTURE.  309 

itaiits,  which  seemed  to  reprove  my  own  inactive  obscurity — 
had  set  me  off  on  one  of  those  Pegase'an  hobbies  on  which 
youth  mounts  to  the  skies — delivering  maidens  on  rocks,  and 
killing  Gorgons  and  monsters — when  Juba  bounded  in,  and 
Blanche  came  after  him,  her  straw-hat  in  her  hand. 

Blaxche. — "  I  thought  you  were  here,  Sisty ;  may  I  stay  ?" 

Pisisteatus. — "  Why,  my  dear  child,  the  day  is  so  fine,  that 
instead  of  losing  it  in-doors,  you  ought  to  be  running  in  the 
fields  with  Juba."' 

Juba. — "  Bow-wow." 

Blaxciie. — "  Will  you  come  too  ?  If  Sisty  stays  in,  Blanche 
does  not  care  for  the  butterflies  I" 

Pisistratus,  seeing  that  the  thread  of  his  day-dreams  is 
broken,  consents  with  an  air  of  resignation.  Just  as  they  gain 
the  door,  Blanche  pauses,  and  looks  as  if  there  were  something 
on  her  mind. 

Pisisteatus. — "  What  now,  Blanche  ?  Why  are  you  mak- 
ing knots  in  that  ribbon,  and  writing  invisible  characters  on 
the  floor  with  the  point  of  that  busy  little  foot  ?" 

Blaxche  (mysteriously) . — "  I  have  found  a  new  room,  Sisty. 
Do  you  think  we  may  look  into  it  ?" 

Pisisteatus. — "Certainly;  unless  any  Bluebeard  of  your 
acquaintance  told  you  not.     Where  is  it  ?" 

Blaxche. — "Up-stairs — to  the  left." 

Pisisteatus. — "  That  little  old  door,  going  down  two  stone 
steps,  which  is  always  kept  locked?" 

Blaxche. — "Yes!  it  is  not  locked  to-day.  The  door  was 
ajar,  and  I  peeped  in ;  but  I  would  not  do  more  till  I  came  and 
asked  you  if  you  thought  it  would  not  be  wrong." 

Pisisteatus. — "  Very  good  in  you,  my  discreet  little  cousin. 
I  have  no  doubt  it  is  a  ghost-trap  ;  however,  with  Juba's  pro- 
tection, I  think  we  might  venture  together." 

Pisistratus,  Blanche,  and  Juba  ascend  the  stairs,  and  turn 
off  down  a  dark  passage  to  the  left,  away  from  the  rooms  in 
use.  We  reached  the  arch-pointed  door  of  oak  planks  nailed 
roughly  together — we  push  it  open,  and  perceive  that  a  small 
stair  winds  down  from  the  room:  it  is  just  over  Roland's 
chamber. 

The  room  has  a  damp  smell,  and  has  probably  been  left  open 
to  be  aired,  for  the  wind  comes  through  the  unbarred  casement, 
and  a  billet  burns  on  the  hearth.     The  place  has  that  attract- 


310  THE   CAXTONS  : 

i\r.  fascinating  air  which  belongs  to  a  lumber-room,  than  which 
1  know  oothing  thai  so  captivates  the  interest  and  fancy  of 
young  people.  What  treasures,  to  them,  often  lie  hid  in  those 
quainl  odds  and  ends  which  the  elder  generations  have  dis- 
carded as  rubbish!  All  children  are  by  nature  antiquarians 
and  relic-hunters.  Still  there  is  an  order  and  precision  with 
which  the  articles  in  that  room  are  stowed  away  that  belies 
the  true  notion  of  lumber — none  of  the  mildew  and  dust  which 
give  such  mournful  interest  to  things  abandoned  to  decay. 

In  one  corner  are  piled  up  cases,  and  military-looking  trunks 
of  outlandish  aspect,  with  R.  D.  C.  in  brass  nails  on  their  sides. 
From  these  we  turn  with  involuntary  respect,  and  call  oft*  Juba, 
Avho  has  wedged  himself  behind  in  pursuit  of  some  imaginary 
mouse.  But  in  the  other  corner  is  what  seems  to  me  a  child's 
cradle — not  an  English  one  evidently:  it  is  of  wood,  seemingly 
Spanish  rosewood,  with  a  railwork  at  the  back,  of  twisted  col- 
umns ;  and  I  should  scarcely  have  known  it  to  be  a  cradle  but 
for  the  fairy-like  quilt  and  the  tiny  pillows  which  proclaimed 
its  uses. 

On  the  wall  above  the  cradle  were  arranged  sundry  little 
articles,  that  had,  perhaps,  once  made  the  joy  of  a  child's  heart 
— broken  toys  with  the  paint  rubbed  off*,  a  tin  sword  and  trump- 
et, and  a  few  tattered  books,  mostly  in  Spanish — by  their  shape 
and  look,  doubtless,  children's  books.  Near  these  stood,  on 
the  floor,  a  picture  with  its  face  to  the  wall.  Juba  had  chased 
the  mouse  that  his  fancy  still  insisted  on  creating,  behind  this 
picture,  and,  as  he  abruptly  drew  back,  the  picture  fell  into  the 
hands  I  stretched  forth  to  receive  it.  I  turned  the  face  to  the 
light,  and  was  surprised  to  see  merely  an  old  family  portrait ; 
it  was  that  of  a  gentleman  in  the  flowTered  vest  and  stiff  ruff 
which  referred  the  date  -of  his  existence  to  the  reign  of  Eliza- 
beth— a  man  with  a  bold  and  noble  countenance.  On  the  cor- 
ner was  ] (laced  a  faded  coat  of  arms,  beneath  which  was  in- 
scribed,  "  Herbert  de  Caxtox,  Eq:  Aur  :  iETxvr :  35." 

On  the  back  of  the  canvass  I  observed,  as  I  now  replaced 
the  picture  against  the  wall,  a  label  in  Roland's  handwriting, 
though  in  a  younger  and  more  running  hand  than  he  now 
wrote.  The  words  were  these: — "The  best  and  bravest  of 
our  line.  He  charged  by  Sydney's  side  on  the  field  of  Zut- 
phen;  he  fought  in  Drake's  ship  against  the  armament  of 
Spain.  If  ever  I  have  a — "  The  rest  of  the  label  seemed  to 
have  been  torn  off. 


A   FAMILY    PICTUKE.  311 

I  turned  away,  and  felt  a  remorseful  shame  that  I  had  so  far 
gratified  my  curiosity, — if  by  so  harsh  a  name  the  powerful 
interest  that  had  absorbed  me  must  be  called.  I  looked  round 
for  Blanche  ;  she  had  retreated  from  my  side  to  the  door,  and, 
with  her  hands  before  her  eyes,  was  weeping.  As  I  stole  to- 
wards her,  my  glance  fell  on  a  book  that  lay  on  a  chair  near 
the  casement,  and  beside  those  relics  of  an  infancy  once  pure 
and  serene.  By  the  old-fashioned  silver  clasps,  I  recognized 
Roland's  Bible.  I  felt  as  if  I  had  been  almost  guilty  of  profa- 
nation in  my  thoughtless  intrusion.  I  drew  away  Blanche, 
and  we  descended  the  stairs  noiselessly ;  and  not  till  we  were 
on  our  favourite  spot,  amidst  a  heap  of  ruins  on  the  feudal 
justice-hill,  did  I  seek  to  kiss  away  her  tears  and  ask  the  cause. 

"My  poor  brother !"  sobbed  Blanche,  "  they  must  have  been 
his — and  we  shall  never,  never  see  him  again! — and  poor 
papa's  Bible,  which  he  reads  when  he  is  very,  very  sad !  I 
did  not  weep  enough  when  my  brother  died.  I  know  better 
what  death  is  now !  Poor  papa !  poor  papa !  Don't  die,  too, 
Sisty !" 

There  was  no  running  after  butterflies  that  morning ;  and 
it  was  long  before  I  could  soothe  Blanche.  Indeed  she  bore 
the  traces  of  dejection  in  her  soft  looks  for  many,  many  days ; 
and  she  often  asked  me,  sighingly,  "  Don't  you  think  it  was 
very  Avrong  in  me  to  take  you  there  ?"  Poor  little  Blanche, 
true  daughter  of  Eve,  she  would  not  let  me  bear  my  due  share 
of  the  blame ;  she  would  have  it  all  in  Adam's  primitive  way 
of  justice — "The  woman  tempted  me,  and  I  did  eat."  And 
since  then  Blanche  has  seemed  more  fond  than  ever  of  Roland, 
and  comparatively  deserts  me  to  nestle  close  to  him,  and 
closer,  till  he  looks  up  and  says,  "  My  child,  you  are  pale :  go 
and  run  after  the  butterflies ;"  and  she  says  now  to  him,  not 
to  me,  "  Come  too !"  drawing  him  out  into  the  sunshine  with 
a  hand  that  will  not  loose  its  hold. 

Of  all  Roland's  line,  this  Herbert  de  Caxton  was  "  the  best 
and  bravest !"  yet  he  had  never  named  that  ancestor  to  me 
— never  put  any  forefather  in  comparison  with  the  dubious 
and  mythical  Sir  William.  I  now  remembered  once,  that,  in 
going  over  the  pedigree,  I  had  been  struck  by  the  name  of 
Herbert — the  only  Herbert  in  the  scroll  —  and  had  asked, 
"What  of  him,  uncle?"  and  Roland  had  muttered  something 
inaudible,  and  turned  away.     And  I  remembered,  also,  that  in 


812  i  -Hi-:  «  ax  tons: 

Roland's  room  there  wsa  the  mark  in  the  wall  where  a  picture 
of  that  Bize  had  once  hung.  The  picture  had  been  removed 
thence  before  we  first  came,  but  must  have  hung  there  for 
years  to  have  Left  that  mark  on  the  Avail;  perhaps  suspended 
by  Bolt,  during  Roland's  long  Continental  absence.  "If  ever 
I  have  a — "  What  were  the  missing  words?  Alas!  did 
they  not  relate  to  the  son — missed  for  ever,  evidently  not  for- 
gotten  still? 


CHAPTER  IV. 

My  uncle  sat  on  one  side  the  fireplace,  my  mother  on  the 
other ;  and  I,  at  a  small  table  between  them,  prepared  to  note 
down  the  results  of  their  conference ;  for  they  had  met  in 
high  council,  to  assess  their  joint  fortunes — determine  what 
should  be  brought  into  the  common  stock,  and  set  aj^art  for 
the  Civil  List,  and  what  should  be  laid  aside  as  a  Sinking 
Fund.  Now  my  mother,  true  woman  as  she  was,  had  a  wom- 
anly love  of  show  in  her  own  quiet  way — of  making  "  a  gen- 
teel figure"  in  the  eyes  of  the  neighbourhood — of  seeing  that 
sixpence  not  only  went  as  far  as  sixpence  ought  to  go,  but 
that,  in  the  going,  it  should  emit  a  mild  but  imposing  splen- 
dour,— not,  indeed,  a  gaudy  flash — a  startling  Borealian  corus- 
cation, which  is  scarcely  within  the  modest  and  placid  idiosyn- 
crasies of  sixpence — but  a  gleam  of  gentle  and  benign  light, 
just  to  show  where  a  sixpence  had  been,  and  allow  you  time 
to  say  "  Behold !"  before 

"  The  jaws  of  darkness  did  devour  it  up." 

Thus,  as  I  once  before  took  occasion  to  apprise  the  reader, 
wc  had  always  held  a  very  respectable  position  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood round  our  square  brick  house ;  been  as  sociable  as 
my  father's  habits  would  permit;  given  our  little  tea-parties, 
and  our  occasional  dinners,  and,  without  attempting  to  vie 
with  our  richer  associates,  there  had  always  been  so  exquisite 
a  neatness,  so  notable  a  housekeeping,  so  thoughtful  a  disposi- 
tion— in  short,  of  all  the  properties  indigenous  to  a  well-spent 
sixpence,  in  tny  mother's  management,  that  there  was  not  an 
old  maid  within  seven  miles  of  ns  who  did  not  pronounce  our 
tea-parties  to  be  perfect  :  ami  the  great  Mrs.  Rollick,  who  gave 


A    FAMILY    PICTUEE.  313 

forty  guineas  a-year  to  a  professed  cook  and  housekeeper,  used 
regularly,  whenever  we  dined  at  Rollick  Hall,  to  call  across 
the  table  to  niy  mother  (who  therewith  blushed  up  to  her 
ears),  to  apologize  for  the  strawberry  jelly.  It  is  true,  that 
when,  on  returning  home,  my  mother  adverted  to  that  flatter- 
ing and  delicate  compliment,  in  a  tone  that  revealed  the  self- 
conceit  of  the  human  heart,  my  father — whether  to  sober  his 
Kitty's  vanity  into  a  proper  and  Christian  mortification  of  spir- 
it, or  from  that  strange  shrewdness  which  belonged  to  him — 
would  remark  that  Mrs.  Rollick  was  of  a  querulous  nature ; 
that  the  compliment  was  meant  not  to  please  my  mother,  but 
to  spite  the  professed  cook  and  housekeeper,  to  whom  the  but- 
ler would  be  sure  to  repeat  the  invidious  apology. 

In  settling  at  the  Tower,  and  assuming  the  head  of  its  estab- 
lishment, my  mother  was  naturally  anxious  that,  poor  battered 
invalid  though  the  Tower  was,  it  should  still  put  its  best  leg 
foremost.  Sundry  cards,  despite  the  thinness  of  the  neigh- 
bourhood, had  been  left  at  the  door ;  various  invitations,  which 
my  uncle  had  hitherto  declined,  had  greeted  his  occupation  of 
the  ancestral  ruin,  and  had  become  more  numerous  since  the 
news  of  our  arrival  had  gone  abroad ;  so  that  my  mother  saw 
before  her  a  very  suitable  field  for  her  hospitable  accomplish- 
ments— a  reasonable  ground  for  her  ambition  that  the  Tower 
should  hold  up  its  head,  as  became  a  Tower  that  held  the  head 
of  the  family. 

But  not  to  wrong  thee,  O  dear  mother !  as  thou  sittest  there, 
opposite  the  grim  Captain,  so  fair  and  so  neat, — with  thine 
apron  as  white,  and  thy  hair  as  trim  and  as  sheen,  and  thy 
morning  cap,  with  its  ribbons  of  blue,  as  coquettishly  arranged 
as  if  thou  hadst  a  fear  that  the  least  negligence  on  thy  part 
might  lose  thee  the  heart  of  thine  Austin — not  to  wrong  thee 
by  setting  down  to  frivolous  motives  alone  thy  feminine  visions 
of  the  social  amenities  of  life,  I  know  that  thine  heart,  in  its 
provident  tenderness,  was  quite  as  much  interested  as  ever  thy 
vanities  could  be,  in  the  hospitable  thoughts  on  which  thou 
wert  intent.  For,  first  and  foremost,  it  was  the  wish  of  thy 
soul  that  thine  Austin  might,  as  little  as  possible,  be  reminded 
of  the  change  in  his  fortunes, — might  miss  as  little  as  possible 
those  interruptions  to  his  abstracted  scholarly  moods,  at  which, 
it  is  true,  he  used  to  fret  and  to  pshaw  and  to  cry  Papas !  but 
which  nevertheless  always  did  him  good,  and  freshened  up  the 

O 


ol-4  in  1:  CAXTONS  : 

Stream  of  his  thoughts.  And,  next,  it  was  the  conviction  of 
thine  understanding  that  a  little  society,  and  boon  companion- 
ing, and  the  proud  pleasure  of  showing  his  ruins,  and  presid- 
ing at  the  hall  of  his  forefathers,  would  take  Roland  out  of- 
those  gloomy  reveries  into  which  he  still  fell  at  times.  And, 
thirdly,  for  us  young  people  ought  not  Blanche  to  find  com- 
panions in  children  of  her  own  sex  and  age?  Already  in  those 
large  black  eyes  there  was  something  melancholy  and  brood- 
ing, as  there  is  in  the  eyes  of  all  children  who  live  only  with 
their  elders;  and  for  Pisistratus,  with  his  altered  prospects, 
and  the  one  great  gnawing  memory  at  his  heart — which  he 
tried  to  conceal  from  himself,  but  which  a  mother  (and  a 
mother  who  had  loved)  saw  at  a  glance — what  could  be  better 
than  such  union  and  interchange  with  the  world  around  us, 
small  though  that  world  might  be,  as  woman,  sweet  binder 
and  blender  of  all  social  links,  might  artfully  effect  ? — So  that 
thou  didst  not  go,  like  the  awful  Florentine, 

"  Sopra  lor  vanita.  die  par  persona," 

"  over  thin  shadows  that  mocked  the  substance  of  real  forms," 
but  rather  it  was  the  real  forms  that  appeared  as  shadows  or 
vanita. 

What  a  digression! — can  I  never  tell  my  story  in  a  plain 
Straight^  >rward  way  ?  Certainly  I  was  born  under  Cancer,  and 
all  my  movements  are  circumlocutory,  sideways,  and  crab-like. 


CHAPTER  V. 

"I  tiiixk,  Poland,"  said  my  mother,  "that  the  establish- 
ment is  settled.  Bolt,  who  is  equal  to  three  men  at  least; 
Primming,  cock  and  housekeeper;  Molly,  a  good  stirring  girl 
— and  willing  (though  I've  had  some  difficulty  in  persuading 
her  to  submit  not  to  be  called  Anna  Maria).  Their  wages  are 
but  a  small  item,  my  dear  Roland." 

"Hem!"  said  Roland;  "since  we  can't  do  with  fewer  serv- 
ants at  less  wages,  I  suppose  we  must  call  it  small." 

"It  is  so,"  said  my  mother,  with  mild  positiveness.  "And, 
indeed,  what  with  the  game  and  fish,  and  the  garden  and 
poultry-yard,  and  your  own  mutton,  our  housekeeping  will  be 
next  to  nothing." 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  315 

"  Hem  !"  again  said  the  thrifty  Roland,  with  a  slight  inflec- 
tion of  the  beetle  brows.  "  It  may  be  next  to  nothing,  ma'am 
— sister — just  as  a  butcher's  shop  may  be  next  to  Northumber- 
land House ;  but  there  is  a  vast  deal  between  nothing  and  that 
next  neighbour  you  have  given  it." 

This  speech  was  so  like  one  of  my  father's — so  naive  an  imita- 
tion of  that  subtle  reasoner's  use  of  the  rhetorical  figure  called 
axtaxaclasis  (or  repetition  of  the  same  words  in  a  different 
sense),  that  I  laughed  and  my  mother  smiled.  But  she  smiled 
reverently,  not  thinking  of  the  axtaxaclasis,  as,  laying  her 
hand  on  Roland's  arm,  she  rejriied  in  the  yet  more  formidable 
figure  of  sj)eech  called  epiphoxema  (or  exclamation),  "Yet, 
with  all  your  economy,  you  would  have  have  had  us — " 

"  Tut !"  cried  my  uncle,  parrying  the  epipiioxema  with  a 
masterly  aposiopesis  (or  breaking  off) ;  "  tut !  if  you  had 
done  what  I  wished,  I  should  have  had  more  pleasure  for  my 
money !" 

My  poor  mother's  rhetorical  armoury  supplied  no  weapon  to 
meet  that  artful  aposiopesis  ;  so  she  dropped  the  rhetoric  alto- 
gether, and  went  on  with  that  "  unadorned  eloquence"  natural 
to  her,  as  to  other  great  financial  reformers  : — "  Well,  Roland, 
but  I  am  a  good  housewife,  I  assure  you,  and — don't  scold ; 
but  that  you  never  do — I  mean,  don't  look  as  if  you  would  like 
to  scold;  the  fact  is,  that,  even  after  setting  aside  £100  a-year 
for  our  little  parties — " 

"  Little  parties ! — a  hundred  a-year  !"  cried  the  Captain, 
aghast. 

My  mother  pursued  her  way  remorselessly — "Which  we  can 
well  afford;  and  without  counting  your  half-pay,  which  you 
must  keep  for  pocket-money  and  your  wardrobe  and  Blanche's, 
I  calculate  that  we  can  allow  Pisistratus  £150  a-year,  which, 
with  the  scholarship  he  is  to  get,  will  keep  him  at  Cambridge" 
(at  that,  seeing  the  scholarship  was  as  yet  amidst  the  Pleasures 
of  Hope,  I  shook  my  head  doubtfully),  "  and,"  continued  my 
mother,  not  heeding  that  sign  of  dissent,  "  we  shall  still  have 
something  to  lay  by." 

The  Captain's  face  assumed  a  ludicrous  expression  of  com- 
passion and  horror ;  he  evidently  thought  my  mother's  misfor- 
tunes had  turned  her  head. 
His  tormentor  continued. 
"  For,"  said  my  mother,  with  a  pretty  calculating  shake  of 


316  THE    CAXTONS  : 

her  head,  and  b  movement  of  the  right  forefinger  towards  the 
five  fingers  of  the  lefl  hand,  "£370 — the  interest  of  Austin's 
fortune — and  £50,  that  we  may  reckon  for  the  rent  of  our 
house,  make  £420  a-year.  Add  your  £330  a-year  from  the 
farm,  Bheep-walk,  and  cottages  that  you  let,  and  the  total  is 
B750.  Now,  with  all  we  get  for  nothing  for  our  housekeep- 
ing, as  I  said  before,  we  can  do  very  well  with  £500  a-year, 
and  indeed  make  a  handsome  figure.  So,  after  allowing  Sisty 
£150,  we  still  have  £100  to  lay  by  for  Blanche." 

"Stop,  stop,  stop!"  cried  the  Captain  in  great  agitation; 
"  who  told  you  that  I  had  £330  a-year?" 

"  Why,  Bolt — don't  be  angry  witli  him." 

"  Bolt  is  a  blockhead.  From  £330  a-year  take  £200,  and 
the  remainder  is  all  my  income,  besides  my  half-pay." 

My  mother  opened  her  eyes,  and  so  did  I. 

"To  that  £130  add,  if  you  pjease,  £130  of  your  own.  All 
that  you  have  over,  my  dear  sister,  is  yours  or  Austin's,  or 
your  boy's ;  but  not  a  shilling  can  go  to  give  luxuries  to  a 
miserly,  battered  old  soldier.     Do  you  understand  me  ?" 

"  Xo,  Roland,"  said  my  mother,  "  I  don't  understand  you  at 
all.     Does  not  your  property  bring  in  £330  a-year?" 

"  Yes,  but  it  has  a  debt  of  £200  a-year  on  it,"  said  the  Cap- 
tain gloomily  and  reluctantly. 

"  Oh,  Roland  !"  cried  my  mother,  tenderly,  and  approaching 
so  near  that,  had  my  father  been  in  the  room,  I  am  sure  she 
would  have  been  bold  enough  to  kiss  the  stern  Captain,  though 
I  never  saw  him  look  sterner,  and  less  kissable — "Oh,  Ro- 
land!" cried  my  mother,  concluding  that  famous  epipiioxema 
which  my  uncle's  aposiopesis  had  before  nipped  in  the  bud, 
"and  yet  you  would  have  made  us,  who  are  twice  as  rich,  rob 
you  of  this  little  all!" 

"  Ah !"  said  Roland,  trying  to  smile,  "  but  I  should  have  had 
my  own  way  then,  and  starved  you  shockingly.  No  talk  then 
of 'little  parties,'  and  such  like.  But  you  must  not  now  turn 
the  tables  against  me,  nor  bring  your  £420  a-year  as  a  set-off 
to  my  €130." 

"Why,"  said  my  mother,  generously,  "you  forget  the  mon- 
ey's \vnrlh  that  you  contribute — all  that  your  grounds  sup- 
ply, and  all  that  we  save  by  it.  I  am  sure  that  that's  worth  a 
yearly  6300  at  the  least." 

"Madam — sister,"  said  the  Captain,  "I'm  sure  you  don't 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  31  7 

want  to  hurt  my  feelings.  All  I  have  to  say  is,  that,  if  you 
add  to  what  I  bring  an  equal  sum — to  keep  up  the  poor  old 
ruin — it  is  the  utmost  that  I  can  allow,  and  the  rest  is  not  more 
than  Pisistratus  can  sj)end." 

So  saying,  the  Captain  rose,  bowed,  and,  before  either  of  us 
could  stop  him,  hobbled  out  of  the  room. 

"  Dear  me,  Sisty !"  said  my  mother,  wringing  her  hands,  "  I 
have  certainly  displeased  him.  How  could  I  guess  he  had  so 
large  a  debt  on  the  property  ?" 

"  Did  not  he  pay  his  son's  debts  ?  Is  not  that  the  reason 
that—" 

"Ah!"  interrupted  my  mother,  almost  crying,  "and  it  was 
that  which  ruffled  him ;  and  I  not  to  guess  it  ?  What  shall  I 
do?" 

"  Set  to  work  at  a  new  calculation,  dear  mother,  and  let  him 
have  his  own  way." 

"  But  then,"  said  my  mother,  "  your  uncle  will  mope  him- 
self to  death,  and  your  father  will  have  no  relaxation,  while 
you  see  that  he  has  lost  his  former  object  in  his  books.  And 
Blanche — and  you  too.  If  we  were  only  to  contribute  what 
dear  Roland  does,  I  do  not  see  how,  with  £260  a-year,  we 
could  ever  bring  our  neighbours  round  us !  I  wonder  what 
Austin  would  say !  I  have  half  a  mind — no,  I'll  go  and  look 
over  the  week-books  with  Primmins." 

My  mother  went  her  way  sorrowfully,  and  I  was  left  alone. 

Then  I  looked  on  the  stately  old  hall,  grand  in  its  forlorn  de- 
cay. And  the  dreams  I  had  begun  to  cherish  at  my  heart 
swept  over  me,  and  hurried  me  along,  far,  far  away  into  the 
golden  land,  whither  Hope  beckons  youth.  To  restore  my  fa- 
ther's fortunes — re-weave  the  links  of  that  broken  ambition 
which  had  knit  his  genius  with  the  world — rebuild  those  fallen 
walls — cultivate  those  barren  moors — revive  the  ancient  name 
— glad  the  old  soldier's  age — and  be  to  both  the  brothers  what 
Roland  had  lost — a  son !  These  were  my  dreams ;  and  when 
I  woke  from  them,  lo !  they  had  left  behind  an  intense  purpose, 
a  resolute  object.  Dream,  O  youth ! — dream  manfully  and 
nobly,  and  thy  dreams  shall  be  prophets ! 


9  Is  i  in-:   CAXTONB 


CHAPTER  VI. 

LETTER   FROM   PISISTRATUS    CAXTON   TO    ALBERT   TREV ANION, 
ESQ.,  M.P. 

( The  confession  of  a  youth  who  in  the  Old  World  finds  himself  one  too  many.) 

"My  dear  Mr. Trev anion, — I  thank  you  cordially,  and  so 
we  do  all,  for  your  reply  to  my  letter,  informing  you  of  the  vil- 
lanous  traps  through  which  we  have  passed — not  indeed  with 
whole  skins,  but  still  whole  in  life  and  limb — which,  consider- 
ing that  the  traps  were  three,  and  the  teeth  sharp,  was  more 
than  wc  could  reasonably  exj^ect.  We  have  taken  to  the  wastes, 
like  wise  foxes  as  we  are,  and  I  do  not  think  a  bait  can  be  found 
that  will  again  snare  the  fox  paternal.  As  for  the  fox  filial,  it 
is  different,  and  I  am  about  to  prove  to  you  that  he  is  burning 
to  redeem  the  family  disgrace.  Ah!  my  dear  Mr.Trevanion, 
if  you  are  busy  with  '  blue-books'  when  this  letter  reaches  you, 
stop  here,  and  put  it  aside  for  some  rare  moment  of  leisure.  I 
am  about  to  open  my  heart  to  you,  and  ask  you,  who  know  the 
world  so  well,  to  aid  me  in  an  escape  from  those  flammantia 
mi,  nid,  wherewith  I  find  that  world  begirt  and  enclosed.  For 
look  you,  sir,  you  and  my  father  were  right  when  you  both 
agreed  that  the  mere  book-life  was  not  meant  for  me.  And 
yet  what  is  not  book-life  to  a  young  man  who  would  make  his 
way  through  the  ordinary  and  conventional  paths  to  fortune  ? 
All  the  professions  are  so  book-lined,  book-hemmed,  book- 
choked,  that  wherever  these  strong  hands  of  mine  stretch  to- 
wards action,  they  find  themselves  met  by  octavo  ramparts, 
flanked  with  quarto  crenellations.  For  first,  this  college  life, 
opening  to  scholarships,  and  ending,  perchance,  as  you  political 
economists  would  desire,  in  Malthnsian  fellowships — premiums 
for  celibacy — consider  what  manner  of  thing  it  is! 

"Three  years,  book  upon  book, — a  great  Dead  Sea  before 
one,  three  years  long,  and  .-ill  the  apples  thai  grow  on  the  shore 

full  of  1  lie  ii^lics  of  pica  and  primer  !  Those  three  years  ended, 
the  fellowship,  il  may  be,  won,  —  still  book* — books — if  the 
whole  world  does  not  close  al  the  college  gates.     Do  I,  from 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  319 

scholar,  effloresce  into  literary  man,  author  by  profession? — 
books — books  !  Do  I  go  into  the  law  ? — books — books !  Ars 
long  a,  vita  brer  is,  which,  paraphrased,  means  that  it  is  slow 
work  before  one  fags  one's  way  to  a  brief!  Do  I  turn  doctor  ? 
Why,  what  but  books  can  kill  time,  until,  at  the  age  of  forty, 
a  lucky  chance  may  permit  me  to  kill  something  else?  The 
church  (for  which,  indeed,  I  don't  profess  to  be  good  enough), 
— that  is  book-life  par  excellence,  whether,  inglorious  and  poor, 
I  wander  through  long  lines  of  divines  and  fathers ;  or,  ambi- 
tious of  bishoprics,  I  amend  the  corruptions,  not  of  the  human 
heart,  but  of  a  Greek  text,  and  through  defiles  of  scholiasts 
and  commentators  wm  my  way  to  the  See.  In  short,  barring 
the  noble  profession  of  arms — which  you  know,  after  all,  is  not 
precisely  the  road  to  fortune — can  you  tell  me  any  means  by 
which  one  may  escape  these  eternal  books,  this  mental  clock- 
work and  corporeal  lethargy?  Where  can  this  passion  for 
life  that  rims  riot  through  my  veins  find  its  vent  ?  Where  can 
these  stalwart  limbs  and  this  broad  chest  grow  of  value  and 
worth,  in  this  hot-bed  of  cerebral  inflammation  and  dyspeptic 
intellect  ?  I  know  what  is  in  me ;  I  know  I  have  the  qualities 
that  should  go  with  stalwart  limbs  and  broad  chest.  I  have 
some  plain  common-sense,  some  promptitude  and  keenness, 
some  pleasure  in  hardy  danger,  some  fortitude  in  bearing  pain 
— qualities  for  which  I  bless  Heaven,  for  they  are  qualities  good 
and  useful  in  private  life.  But  in  the  forimi  of  men,  in  the 
market  of  fortune,  are  they  not  flocci,  nauci,  niJiillP 

"  In  a  word,  dear  sir  and  friend,  hi  this  crowded  Old  World, 
there  is  not  the  same  room  that  our  bold  forefathers  found  for 
men  to  walk  about  and  jostle  their  neighbours.  Xo ;  they 
must  sit  down  like  boys  at  their  form,  and  work  out  their  tasks, 
with  rounded  shoulders  and  aching  fingers.  There  has  been 
a  pastoral  age,  and  a  hunting  age,  and  a  fighting  age.  Now 
Ave  have  arrived  at  the  age  sedentary.  Men  who  sit  long- 
est carry  all  before  them :  puny  delicate  fellows,  with  hands 
just  strong  enough  to  wield  a  pen,  eyes  so  bleared  by  the  mid- 
night lamp  that  they  see  no  joy  hi  that  buxom  sun  (which 
draws  me  forth  into  the  fields,  as  life  draws  the  living),  and 
digestive  organs  worn  and  macerated  by  the  relentless  flaggel- 
lation  of  the  brain.  Certainly,  if  this  is  to  be  the  Reign  of 
Mind,  it  is  idle  to  repine,  and  kick  against  the  pricks  ;  but  is  it 
true  that  all  these  qualities  of  action  that  are  within  me  are  to 


120  rHE  caxtons: 

go  for  nothing?  If  I  were  rich  and  happy  in  mind  and  cir- 
cumstances, well  and  good;  I  should  shoot,  hunt,  farm,  travel, 
enjoy  life,  and  snap  my  fingers  at  ambition.  If  I  were  so  poor 
and  so  humbly  bred  that  I  could  turn  gamekeeper  or  whipper- 
in,  as  pauper  gentlemen  virtually  did  of  old,  well  and  good  too  \d 
I  should  exhaust  this  troublesome  vitality  of  mine  by  nightly 
battles  with  poachers,  and  leaps  over  double  dykes  and  stone 
walls.  If  I  were  so  depressed  of  spirit  that  I  could  live  with- 
out remorse  on  my  lather's  small  means,  arid  exclaim  with  Clau- 
dian, 'The  earth  gives  me  feasts  that  cost  nothing,'  well  and 
good  too ;  it  were  a  life  to  suit  a  vegetable,  or  a  very  minor 
poet.  But  as  it  is  ! — here  I  open  another  leaf  of  my  heart  to 
you !  To  say  that,  being  poor,  I  want  to  make  a  fortune,  is  to 
say  that  I  am  an  Englishman.  To  attach  ourselves  to  a  thing 
positive,  belongs  to  our  practical  race.  Even  in  our  dreams, 
if  we  build  castles  in  the  air,  they  are  not  Castles  of  Indolence, 
— indeed,  they  have  very  little  of  the  castle  about  them,  and 
look  much  more  like  Hoare's  Bank  on  the  east  side  of  Temple 
Bar !  I  desire,  then,  to  make  a  fortune.  But  I  diifer  from  my 
countrymen,  first,  by  desiring  only  what  you  rich  men  would 
call  but  a  small  fortune;  secondly, in  wishing  that  I  may  not 
spend  my  whole  life  in  that  fortune-making.  Just  see,  now, 
how  I  am  placed. 

"Under  ordinary  circumstances,  I  must  begin  by  taking 
from  my  father  a  large  slice  of  an  income  that  will  ill  Bpare 
paring.  According  to  my  calculation,  my  parents  and  my  un- 
cle want  all  they  have  got — and  the  subtraction  of  the  year- 
ly sum  on  which  Pisistratus  is  to  live,  till  he  can  live  by  his 
own  labours,  would  be  so  much  taken  from  the  decent  comforts 
of  his  kindied.  If  I  return  to  Cambridge,  with  all  economy, 
I  must  thus  narrow  still  more  the  res  angusta  domi — and  when 
Cambridge  is  over,  and  I  am  turned  loose  upon  the  world — 
failing,  as  is  likely  enough,  of  the  support  of  a  fellowship — 
how  many  years  must  I  work,  or  rather,  alas!  not  work,  at 
ihe  bar  (which,  after  all,  seems  my  best  calling),  before  I  can 
in  my  turn  provide  for  those  who,  till  then,  rob  themselves  for 
me? — till  I  have  arrived  at  middle  life,  and  they  are  old  and 
worn  out — till  the  chink  of  the  golden  bowl  sounds  but  hollow 
'  ill'-  ebbing  well!  I  would  wish  that,  if  I  can  make  money, 
those  I  love  best   may  enjoy  it   while  enjoyment   is  yet  left  to 

them;  thai  my  father  shall  see  77u  Jlistory  of  Human  Error 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  321 

complete,  bound  in  russia  on  his  shelves ;  that  my  mother  shall 
have  the  innocent  pleasures  that  content  her,  before  age  steals 
the  light  from  her  happy  smile ;  that  before  Roland's  hair  is 
snow-white  (alas !  the  snows  there  thicken  fast),  he  shall  lean 
on  my  arm,  while  we  settle  together  where  the  ruin  shall  be 
repaired  or  where  left  to  the  owls ;  and  where  the  dreary  bleak 
waste  around  shall  laugh  with  the  gleam  of  corn : — for  you 
know  the  nature  of  this  Cumberland  soil — you,  who  possess 
much  of  it,  and  have  won  so  many  fair  acres  from  the  wild : — 
you  know  that  my  uncle's  land,  now  (save  a  single  farm)  scarce 
worth  a  shilling  an  acre,  needs  but  capital  to  become  an  estate 
more  lucrative  than  ever  his  ancestors  owned.  You  know  that, 
for  you  have  applied  your  capital  to  the  same  kind  of  land,  and, 
in  doing  so,  what  blessings — which  you  scarcely  think  of  in 
your  London  library — you  have  effected ! — what  mouths  you 
feed,  what  hands  you  employ !  I  have  calculated  that  my  un- 
cle's moors,  which  now  scarce  maintain  two  or  three  shepherds, 
could,  manured  by  money,  maintain  two  hundred  families  by 
their  labour.  All  this  is  worth  trying  for !  therefore  Pisistra- 
tns  wants  to  make  money.  Not  so  much !  he  does  not  require 
millions — a  few  spare  thousand  pounds  would  go  a  long  way ; 
and  with  a  modest  capital  to  begin  with,  Roland  should  be- 
come a  true  squire,  a  real  landowner,  not  the  mere  lord  of  a 
desert.  Now  then,  dear  sir,  advise  me  how  I  may,  with  such 
qualities  as  I  possess,  arrive  at  that  cajntal — ay,  and  before  it 
is  too  late — so  that  money-making  may  not  last  till  my  grave. 
"  Turning  in  despair  from  this  civilized  world  of  ours,  I  have 
cast  my  eyes  to  a  world  far  older, — and  yet  more,  to  a  world 
in  its  giant  childhood.  India  here, — Australia  there! — what 
say  yon,  sir — you  who  will  see  dispassionately  those  things 
that  float  before  my  eyes  through  a  golden  haze,  looming  large 
in  the  distance?  Such  is  my  confidence  in  your  judgment, 
that  you  have  but  to  say,  '  Fool,  give  up  thine  El  Dorados  and 
stay  at  home — stick  to  the  books  and  the  desk — annihilate 
that  redundance  of  animal  life  that  is  in  thee — grow  a  mental 
machine — thy  physical  gifts  are  of  no  avail  to  thee — take  thy 
place  among  the  slaves  of  the  Lamp' — and  I  will  obey  without 
a  murmur.  But  if  I  am  right— if  I  have  in  me  attributes  that 
here  find  no  market ;  if  my  repinings  are  but  the  instincts  of 
nature,  that  out  of  this  decrepit  civilization,  desire  vent  for 
growth  in  the  young  stir  of  some  more  rude  and  vigorous 

02 


322  THE   CAXT0N8  : 

social  system — then  give  mc,  I  pray,  that  advice  which  may 
clothe  my  idea  in  b<  me  practical  and  tangible  embodiments. 
Bave  I  made  myself  understood  ? 

"  We  take  qo  newspaper  here,  but  occasionally  one  finds  its 
way  from  the  parsonage;  and  1  have  lately  rejoiced  at  a  para- 
graph that  spoke  of  your  speedy  entrance  into  the  Adminis- 
tration as  a  thing  certain.  I  write  to  you  before  you  are  a 
minister;  and  you  see  what  I  seek  is  not  in  the  way  of  official 
patronage:  A  niche  in  an  office!  oh,  to  me  that  were  worse 
than  all.  Yet  I  did  labour  hard  with  you,  but — that  was  dif- 
ferent: I  write  to  you  thus  frankly,  knowing  your  warm  noble 
heart — and  as  if  you  were  my  father.  Allowr  me  to  add  my 
humble  but  earnest  congratulations  on  Miss  Trevanion's  ap- 
proaching marriage  with  one  worthy,  if  not  of  her,  at  least  of 
her  station.  I  do  so  as  becomes  one  whom  you  have  allowed 
to  retain  the  right  to  pray  for  the  happiness  of  you  and  yours. 

"My  dear  Mr.  Trevanion,  this  is  a  long  letter,  and  I  dare 
not  even  read  it  over,  lest,  if  I  do,  I  should  not  send  it.  Take 
it  with  all  its  faults,  and  judge  of  it  with  that  kindness  with 
which  you  have  judged  ever 

"  Your  grateful  and  devoted  servant, 

"  PlSISTEATUS  CAXTON." 


LETTER  FROM   ALBERT  TREVANION,  ESQ.,  M.P.,  TO  PISISTRATUS 

(  A  XTON. 

"  Library  of  the  House  of  Commons,  Tuesday  night. 
"  My  dear  Pisistratus, — *****  is  up !  we  are  in  for  it  for 
two  mortal  hours.  I  take  flight  to  the  library,  and  devote 
those  hours  to  you.  Don't  be  conceited,  but  that  picture  of 
yourself  which  you  have  placed  before  me  has  struck  me  with 
all  the  force  of  an  original.  The  state  of  mind  which  you  de- 
scribe so  vividly  must  be  a  very  common  one,  in  our  era  of 
civilization,  yet  I  have  never  before  seen  it  made  so  prominent 
and  lifelike.  You  have  been  in  my  thoughts  all  day.  Yes, 
how  many  young  men  musl  there  be  like  you,  in  this  Old 
World,  able,  intelligent,  active,  and  persevering  enough,  yet 
not  adapted  lor  success  in  any  of  our  conventional  professions 
— 'unite,  inglorious  Etaleighs.'  Your  letter,  young  artist,  is 
an  illustration  of  the  philosophy  of  colonizing.     T  comprehend 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  323 

better,  after  reading  it,  the  old  Greek  colonization, — the  send- 
ing ont  not  only  the  paupers,  the  refuse  of  an  over-populated 
state,  but  a  large  proportion  of  a  better  class — fellows  full  of 
pith  and  sap,  and  exuberant  vitality,  like  yourself,  blending, 
in  those  wise  cleruchice,  a  certain  portion  of  the  aristocratic 
with  the  more  democratic  element ;  not  turning  a  rabble  loose 
upon  a  new  soil,  but  planting  in  the  foreign  allotments  all  the 
rudiments  of  a  harmonious  state,  analogous  to  that  in  the  moth- 
er country — not  only  getting  rid  of  hungry  craving  mouths, 
but  furnishing  vent  for  a  waste  surplus  of  intelligence  and  cour- 
age, which  at  home  is  really  not  needed,  and  more  often  comes 
to  ill  than  to  good ; — here  only  menaces  our  artificial  embank- 
ments, but  there,  carried  off  in  an  aqueduct,  might  give  life  to 
a  desert. 

"For  my  part,  in  my  ideal  of  colonization, I  should  like  that 
each  exportation  of  human  beings  had,  as  of  old,  its  leaders  and 
chiefs — not  so  appointed  from  the  mere  quality  of  rank,  often 
indeed  taken  from  the  humbler  classes — but  still  men  to  whom 
a  certain  degree  of  education  should  give  promptitude,  quick- 
ness, adaptability — men  in  whom  their  followers  can  confide. 
The  Greeks  understood  that.  Nay,  as  the  colony  makes  prog- 
ress— as  its  principal  town  rises  into  the  dignity  of  a  capital — 
spoils  that  needs  a  polity — I  sometimes  think  it  might  be  wise 
to  go  still  farther,  and  not  only  transplant  to  it  a  high  standard 
of  civilization,  but  draw  it  more  closely  into  connection  with 
the  parent  state,  and  render  the  passage  of  spare  intellect,  ed- 
ucation, and  civility,  to  and  fro,  more  facile,  by  drafting  off 
thither  the  spare  scions  of  royalty  itself.  I  know  that  many 
of  my  more  '  liberal'  friends  would  poohpooh  this  notion  ;  but 
I  am  sure  that  the  colony  altogether,  when  arrived  to  a  state 
that  would  bear  the  importation,  would  thrive  all  the  better 
for  it.  And  when  the  day  shall  come  (as  to  all  healthful  col- 
onies it  must  come  sooner  or  later), in  which  the  settlement  has 
grown  an  independent  state,  we  may  thereby  have  laid  the 
seeds  of  a  constitution  and  a  civilization  similar  to  our  own — 
with  self-developed  forms  of  monarchy  and  aristocracy,  though 
of  a  simpler  growth  than  old  societies  accept,  and  not  left  a 
strange  motley  chaos  of  struggling  democracy — an  uncouth 
livid  giant,  at  which  the  Frankenstein  may  well  tremble — not 
because  it  is  a  giant,  but  because  it  is  a  giant  half  completed.* 

*  These  pages  were  sent  to  press  before  the  author  had  soon  Mr.  Wake- 


12  I  II  IK   CAXTONS  : 

Depend  on  it,  the  New  World  will  be  friendly  or  hostile  to  the 
Old,  not  in  proportion  to  the  kinship  of  race,  but  in  proportion 
to  thi  similarity  of  manners  and  institutions — a  mighty  truth, 
to  which  we  colonizers  have  been  blind. 

"Passing  from  these  more  distant  speculations  to  this  posi- 
tive present  before  us,  you  see  already,  from  what  I  have  said, 
that  T  sympathize  with  your  aspirations — that  I  construe  them 
as  you  would  have  me  ; — looking  to  your  nature  and  to  your 
objects,  I  give  you  my  advice  in  a  word — Emigrate  ! 

"My  advice  is,  however,  founded  on  one  hypothesis — viz. 
that  you  are  perfectly  sincere — you  will  be  contented  with  a 
rough  life,  and  with  a  moderate  fortune  at  the  end  of  your  pro- 
bation. Don't  dream  of  emigrating  if  you  want  to  make  a  mil- 
lion, or  the  tenth  part  of  a  million.  Don't  dream  of  emigra- 
ting, unless  you  can  enjoy  its  hardships, — to  bear  them  is  not 
enough ! 

"Australia  is  the  land  for  you,  as  you  seem  to  surmise. 
Australia  is  the  land  for  two  classes  of  emigrants :  1st,  The 
man  who  has  nothing  but  his  wits,  and  plenty  of  them  ;  2dly, 
The  man  who  has  a  small  capital,  and  who  is  contented  to 
spend  ten  years  in  trebling  it.  I  assume  that  you  belong  to 
the  latter  class.  Take  out  £3000,  and,  before  you  are  thirty 
years  old,  you  may  return  with  £10,000  or  £12,000.  If  that 
satisfies  you,  think  seriously  of  Australia.  By  coach,  to-mor- 
row, I  will  send  you  down  all  the  best  books  and  reports  on 
the  subject ;  and  I  will  get  you  what  detailed  information  I 
can  from  the  Colonial  Office.  Having  read  these,  and  thought 
over  them  dispassionately,  spend  some  months  yet  among  the 
sheep-walks  of  Cumberland;  learn  all  you  can,  from  all  the 
shepherds  you  can  find — from  Thyrsis  to  Menalcas.  Do  more  ; 
fit  yourself  in  every  way  for  a  life  in  the  Bush,  where  the  phi- 
losophy of  the  division  of  labour  is  not  yet  arrived  at.  Learn 
to  turn  your  hand  to  everything.  Be  something  of  a  smith, 
something  of  a  carpenter — do  the  best  you  can  with  the  few- 
31  tools;  make  yourself  an  excellent  shot;  break  in  all  the 
wild  horses  and  ponies  you  can  borrow  and  beg.  Even  if  you 
want  to  do  none  of  these  tilings  when  in  your  settlement,  the 

field's  recent  work  on  Colonization,  wherein  the  views  here  expressed  are  en- 
forced with  greal  earnestness  and  conspicuous  sagacity.  The  author  is  not 
the  Less  pleased  -m  this  coincidence  of  opinion,  because  he  lias  the  misfortune 
•  i  dissent  from  certain  other  parts  of  Mr. Wakefield's  celebrated  theory. 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  325 

having  learned  to  do  them  will  fit  you  for  many  other  things 
not  now  foreseen.  De-fine-gentlemanize  yourself  from  the 
crown  of  your  head  to  the  sole  of  your  foot,  and  become  the 
greater  aristocrat  for  so  doing ;  for  he  is  more  than  an  aristo- 
crat, he  is  a  king,  who  suffices  in  all  things  for  himself — who  is 
his  own  master,  because  he  wants  no  valetaille.  I  think  Sen- 
eca has  expressed  that  thought  before  me  ;  and  I  would  quote 
the  passage,  but  the  book,  I  fear,  is  not  in  the  library  of  the 
House  of  Commons.     But  now  (cheers,  by  Jove !  I  suppose 

*****  is  down  !     Ah  !  it  is  so  ;  and  C is  up,  and  that  cheer 

followed  a  sharp  hit  at  me.  How  I  wish  I  were  your  age,  and 
going  to  Australia  with  you  !) — But  now — to  resume  my  sus- 
pended period — but  now  to  the  important  point — capital. 
You  must  take  that,  unless  you  go  as  a  shepherd,  and  then 
good-by  to  the  idea  of  £10,000  in  ten  years.  So,  you  see,  it 
appears  at  the  first  blush  that  you  must  still  come  to  your  fa- 
ther ;  but,  you  will  say,  with  this  difference,  that  you  borrow 
the  capital  with  every  chance  of  repaying  it,  instead  of  fritter- 
ing away  the  income  year  after  year  till  you  are  eight-and-thir- 
ty  or  forty  at  least.  Still,  Pisistratus,  you  don't,  in  this,  gain 
your  object  at  a  leap ;  and  my  dear  old  friend  ought  not  to 
lose  his  son  and  his  money  too.  You  say  you  write  to  me  as 
to  your  own  father.  You  know  I  hate  professions ;  and  if  you 
did  not  mean  what  you  say,  you  have  offended  me  mortally. 
As  a  father,  then,  I  take  a  father's  rights,  and  speak  plainly.  A 
friend  of  mine,  Mr.  Bolding,  a  clergyman,  has  a  son — a  wild  fel- 
low, who  is  likely  to  get  into  all  sorts  of  scrapes  in  England, 
but  with  plenty  of  good  in  him,  notwithstanding — frank,  bold 
— not  wanting  in  talent,  but  rather  in  prudence — easily  tempt- 
ed and  led  away  into  extravagance.  He  would  make  a  capital 
colonist  (no  such  temptations  in  the  Bush  !)  if  tied  to  a  youth 
like  you.  Now  I  propose,  with  your  leave,  that  his  father 
shall  advance  him  £1500,  which  shall  not,  however,  be  placed 
in  his  hands,  but  in  yours,  as  head  partner  in  the  firm.  You, 
on  your  side,  shall  advance  the  same  sum  of  £1500,  which  you 
shall  borrow  from  me,  for  three  years  without  interest.  At 
the  end  of  that  time  interest  shall  commence  ;  and  the  capital, 
with  the  interest  on  the  said  first  three  years,  shall  be  repaid 
to  me,  or  my  executors,  on  your  return.  After  you  have  been 
a  year  or  two  in  the  Bush,  and  felt  your  way,  and  learned  your 
business,  you  may  then  safely  borrow  £1500  more  from  your 


THE   I  axtons  : 

father  ;  and,  in  the  meanwhile,  you  and  your  partner  will  have 
had  together  the  full  Bum  of  t':>000  to  commence  with.  Sou 
in  this  proposal  I  make  you  no  gilt,  and  I  run  no  risk, even 
by  your  death.  If  you  die  insolvent,  I  will  promise  to  come 
on  your  father,  poor  fellow  ! — for  small  joy  and  small  care  will 
he  have  then  in  what  may  be  left  of  his  fortune.  There — I 
have  said  all ;  and  I  will  never  forgive  you  if  you  reject  an  aid 
that  will  serve  you  so  much,  and  cost  me  so  little. 

"I  accept  your  congratulations  on  Fanny's  engagement 
with  Lord  Castleton.  When  you  return  from  Australia  you 
will  still  be  a  young  man,  she  (though  about  your  own  years) 
almost  a  middle-aged  woman,  with  her  head  full  of  pomps  and 
vanities.  All  girls  have  a  short  period  of  girlhood  in  common ; 
but  when  they  enter  womanhood  the  woman  becomes  the 
woman  of  her  class.  As  for  me,  and  the  office  assigned  to  me 
by  report,  you  know  what  I  said  when  we  parted,  and — but 

here  J comes,  and  tells  me  that  CI  am  expected  to  speak, 

and  answer  X ,  who  is  just  up,  brimful  of  malice,' — the 

House  crowded,  and  hungering  for  personalities.  So  I,  the 
man  of  the  Old  World,  gird  up  my  loins,  and  leave  you  with 
a  sigh,  to  the  fresh  youth  of  the  Xew — 

"  'Ne  tibi  sit  duros  acuisse  in  proclia  dentes.' 
"Yours  affectionately,  Albert  Teevaniox." 


CHAPTER  VII. 

So,  reader,  thou  art  now  at  the  secret  of  my  heart. 

Wonder  not  that  I,  a  bookman's  son,  and,  at  certain  periods 
of  my  life,  a  bookman  myself,  though  of  lowly  grade  in  that 
venerable  class — wonder  not  that  I  should  thus,  in  that  tran- 
sition state  between  youth  and  manhood,  have  turned  impa- 
tiently from  books. — .Most  students,  at  one  time  or  other  in 
their  existence,  have  felt  the  imperious  demand  of  that  restless 
principle  in  man's  nature,  which  calls  upon  each  son  of  Adam 
to  contribute  his  share  to  the  vast  treasury  of  human  deeds. 
And  though  great  scholars  .are  not  necessarily,  nor  usually, 
men  of  action, — yet  the  men  of  action  whom  History  presents 
in  our  survey  have  rarely  been  without  a  certain  degree  of 
scholarly  nurture.  For  the  ideas  which  books  quicken,  books 
cannot  always  satisfy.     Ami  though  the  royal  pupil  of  Aris- 


A    FAMILY    PICTUKE.  327 

totle  slept  with  Homer  under  his  pillow,  it  was  not  that  he 
might  dream  of  composing  epics,  but  of  conquering  new  Ilions 
in  the  East.  Many  a  man,  how  little  soever  resembling  Alex- 
ander, may  still  have  the  conqueror's  aim  in  an  object  that  ac- 
tion only  can  achieve,  and  the  book  under  his  pillow  may  be 
the  strongest  antidote  to  his  repose.  And  how  the  stern  Des- 
tinies that  shall  govern  the  man  weave  their  first  delicate  tis- 
sues amidst  the  earliest  associations  of  the  child ! — Those  idle 
tales  with  which  the  old  credulous  nurse  had  beguiled  my  in- 
fancy— tales  of  wonder,  knight-errantry,  and  adventure,  had 
left  behind  them  seeds  long  latent — seeds  that  might  never 
have  sprung  up  above  the  soil — but  that  my  boyhood  was  so 
early  put  under  the  burning-glass,  and  in  the  quick  forcing- 
house,  of  the  London  world.  There,  even  amidst  books  and 
study,  lively  observation  and  petulant  ambition  broke  forth 
from  the  lush  foliage  of  romance — that  fruitless  leafiness  of 
poetic  youth !  And  there  passion,  which  is  a  revolution  in  all 
the  elements  of  individual  man,  had  called  a  new  state  of  be- 
ing, turbulent  and  eager,  out  of  the  old  habits  and  convention- 
al forms  it  had  buried — ashes  that  sjieak  where  the  fire  has 
been.  Far  from  me,  as  from  any  mind  of  some  manliness,  be 
the  attempt  to  create  interest  by  dwelling  at  length  on  the 
struggles  against  a  rash  and  misplaced  attachment,  which  it 
was  my  duty  to  overcome ;  but  all  such  love,  as  I  have  before 
implied,  is  a  terrible  unsettler : — 

"  Where  once  such  fairies  dance,  no  grass  doth  ever  grow." 
To  re-enter  boyhood,  go  with  meek  docility  through  its  dis- 
ciplined routine — how  hard  had  I  found  that  return,  amidst 
the  cloistered  monotony  of  college !  My  love  for  my  father, 
and  my  submission  to  his  wish,  had  indeed  given  some  anima- 
tion to  objects  otherwise  distasteful ;  but,  now  that  my  return 
to  the  University  must  be  attended  with  positive  privation  to 
those  at  home,  the  idea  became  utterly  hateful  and  repugnant. 
Under  pretence  that  I  found  myself,  on  trial,  not  yet  sufficient- 
ly prepared  to  do  credit  to  my  father's  name,  I  had  easily  ob- 
tained leave  to  lose  the  ensuing  term,  and  pursue  my  studies 
at  home.  This  gave  me  time  to  prepare  my  plans,  and  bring 
round — how  shall  I  ever  bring  round  to  my  adventurous  views 
those  whom  I  propose  to  desert  ?  Hard  it  is  to  get  on  in  the 
world — very  hard !  But  the  most  painful  step  in  the  way  is 
that  which  starts  from  the  threshold  of  a  beloved  home. 


328  THE   <  avion s. 

Bow — ah, how  Indeed  !  "No,  Blanche,  you  cannot  join  mo 
to-day  ;  I  am  going  out  for  many  hours.  So  it  will  be  late  be- 
fore  I  can  be  home." 

Borne!— the  word  chokes  me!  Juba  slinks  back  to  his 
young  mistress,  disconsolate;  Blanche  gazes  at  me  ruefully 
from  our  favourite  hill-top,  and  the  flowers  she  has  been  gath- 
ering fall  unheeded  from  her  basket.  I  hear  my  mother's  voice 
Binging  low,  as  she  sits  at  work  by  her  open  casement.  How, 
— ah,  how  indeed ! 


PAET  THIRTEENTH. 

CHAPTER  I. 

St.  Chrysostcxm:,  in  his  work  on  The  Priesthood,  defends  de- 
ceit, if  for  a  good  purpose,  by  many  Scriptural  examples ;  ends 
his  first  book  by  asserting  that  it  is  often  necessary,  and  that 
much  benefit  may  arise  from  it ;  and  begins  his  second  book 
by  saying  that  it  ought  not  to  be  called  deceit,  but  good  man- 
agement.* 

Good  management,  then,  let  me  call  the  innocent  arts  by 
which  I  now  sought  to  insinuate  my  project  into  favour  and 
assent  with  my  unsuspecting  family.  At  first  I  began  with 
Roland.  I  easily  induced  him  to  read  some  of  the  books,  full 
of  the  charm  of  Australian  life,  which  Trevanion  had  sent  me ; 
and  so  happily  did  those  descriptions  suit  his  own  erratic 
tastes,  and  the  free  half-savage  man  that  lay  rough  and  large 
within  that  soldierly  nature,  that  he  himself,  as  it  were,  seem- 
ed to  suggest  my  own  ardent  desire — sighed,  as  the  care-worn 
Trevanion  had  done,  that  "  he  was  not  my  age,"  and  blew  the 
flame  that  consumed  me  with  his  own  willing  breath.  So 
that  when  at  last — wandering  one  day  over  the  wild  moors — 
I  said,  knowing  his  hatred  of  law  and  lawyers — "  Alas,  uncle, 
that  nothing  should  be  left  for  me  but  the  bar!"  Captain  Ro- 
land struck  his  cane  into  the  peat,  and  exclaimed,  "  Zounds, 
sir !  the  bar  and  lying,  with  truth  and  a  world  fresh  from  God 
before  you !" 

"  Your  hand,  uncle — we  understand  each  other.  Now  help 
me  with  those  two  quiet  hearts  at  home !" 

"  Plague  on  my  tongue !  what  have  I  done  ?"  said  the  Cap- 
tain,  looking  aghast.  Then,  after  musing  a  little  time,  he  turn- 
ed his  dark  eye  on  me,  and  growled  out,  "  I  suspect,  young  sir, 
you  have  been  laying  a  trap  for  me ;  and  I  have  fallen  into  it, 
like  an  old  fool  as  I  am." 

"  Oh,  sir,  if  you  j^refer  the  bar ! — " 

"Rogue!" 

*  Hohler's  Translation. 


330  THE   CAXTONS: 

M  ( >r.  indeed,  I  mighl  perhaps  get  a  clerkship  in  a  merchant's 
office 

"  It' you  do,  1  will  scratch  you  out  of  the  pedigree  I" 
M  Huzza,  then,  for  Australasia!" 
"  Well,  well,  well,"  said  my  uncle, 

"  With  a  smile  on  his  lip,  and  a  tear  in  his  eye ;" 
"the  old  sea-king's  blood  will  force  its  way — a  soldier  or  a 
rover,  there  is  no  other  choice  for  you.     We  shall  mourn  and 
miss  you ;  hut  who  can  chain  the  young  eagles  to  the  eyrie  ?" 

I  had  a  harder  task  with  my  father,  who  at  first  seemed  to 
listen  to  me  as  if  I  had  been  talking  of  an  excursion  to  the 
moon.  But  I  threw  in  a  dexterous  dose  of  the  old  Greek 
( flentchicB — cited  by  Trevanion — which  set  him  off  full  trot  on 
his  hobby,  till  after  a  short  excursion  to  Euboca  and  the  Cher- 
sonese, he  was  fairly  lost  amidst  the  Ionian  colonies  of  Asia 
Minor.  I  then  gradually  and  artfully  decoyed  him  into  his  fa- 
vourite science  of  Ethnology ;  and  while  he  was  speculating  on 
the  origin  of  the  American  savages,  and  considering  the  rival 
claims  of  Cimmerians,  Israelites,  and  Scandinavians,  I  said  qui- 
etly, "  And  you,  sir,  who  think  that  all  human  improvement  de- 
pends on  the  mixture  of  races — you,  whose  whole  theory  is  an 
absolute  sermon  upon  emigration,  and  the  transplanting  and 
interpolity  of  our  species — you,  sir,  should  be  the  last  man  to 
chain  your  son,  your  elder  son,  to  the  soil,  while  your  younger 
is  the  very  missionary  of  rovers." 

"  Pisistratus,"  said  my  father,  "  you  reason  by  synecdoelic — 
ornamental  but  illogical ;"  and  therewith,  resolved  to  hear  no 
more,  my  father  rose  and  retreated  into  his  study. 

But  his  observation,  now  quickened,  began  from  that  day  to 
follow  my  moods  and  humours — then  he  himself  grew  silent 
and  thoughl  fid,  and  finally  he  took  to  long  conferences  with  Ro- 
land. The  result  was  that,  one  evening  in  spring,  as  I  lay  list- 
Less  amidst  the  weeds  and  fern  that  sprang  up  through  the 
melancholy  ruins,  T  felt  a  hand  on  my  shoulder ;  and  my  father, 
seating  himself  beside  me  on  a  fragment  of  stone,  said  earnest- 
ly, "  Pisistratus,  let  us  talk — I  had  hoped  better  things  from 
your  study  of  Robert  Hall." 

"Nay,  dear  father,  the  medicine  did  me  great  good:  I  have 
not  repined  since,  and  I  look  steadfastly  and  cheerfully  on 
life  But  Robert  Hall  fulfilled  his  mission,  and  I  would  fulfil 
mine.'" 

"  1-  there  no  mission  in  thy  native  land,  O  planeticose  and 


A    FAMILY    PICTUEE.  331 

exallotriote  spirit  ?"*  asked  niy  father,  with  compassionate  re- 
buke. 

"  Alas,  yes !  But  what  the  impulse  of  genius  is  to  the  great, 
the  instinct  of  vocation  is  to  the  mediocre.  In  every  man  there 
is  a  magnet ;  in  that  thing  which  the  man  can  do  best  there  is 
a  loadstone." 

"Papse!"  said  my  father,  opening  his  eyes;  "and  are  no 
loadstones  to  be  found  for  you  nearer  than  the  Great  Austral- 
asian Bight  ?" 

"  Ah,  sir,  if  you  resort  to  irony,  I  can  say  no  more !"  My 
father  looked  down  on  me  tenderly,  as  I  hung  my  head,  moody 
and  abashed. 

"  Son,"  said  he,  "  do  you  think  that  there  is  any  real  jest  at 
my  heart,  when  the  matter  discussed  is  whether  you  are  to  put 
wide  seas  and  long  years  between  us  ?"  I  pressed  nearer  to 
his  side,  and  made  no  answer. 

"But  I  have  noted  you  of  late,"  continued  my  father,  "and 
I  have  observed  that  your  old  studies  are  grown  distasteful  to 
you ;  and  I  have  talked  with  Roland,  and  I  see  that  your  de- 
sire is  deeper  than  a  boy's  mere  whim.  And  then  I  have  ask- 
ed myself  what  prospect  I  can  hold  out  at  home  to  induce  you 
to  be  contented  here,  and  I  see  none ;  and  therefore,  I  should 
say  to  you,  "  Go  thy  ways,  and  God  shield  thee — but,  Pisis- 
tratus,  your  mother!" 

"  Ah,  sir,  that  is  indeed  the  question !  and  there  indeed  I 
shrink.  But,  after  all,  whatever  I  were — whether  toiling  at 
the  bar  or  in  some  public  office — I  should  be  still  so  much  from 
home  and  her.  And  then  you,  sir,  she  loves  you  so  entirely, 
that—" 

"  ISTo,"  interrupted  my  father ;  "  you  can  advance  no  argu- 
ments like  these  to  touch  a  mother's  heart.  There  is  but  one 
argument  that  comes  home  there — is  it  for  your  good  to  leave 
her  ?  If  so,  there  will  be  no  need  of  further  words.  But  let 
us  not  decide  that  question  hastily ;  let  you  and  I  be  together 
the  next  two  months.  Bring  your  books  and  sit  with  me ; 
when  you  want  to  go  out,  tap  me  on  the  shoulder,  and  say 
'  Come.'  At  the  end  of  those  two  months  I  will  say  to  you 
1  Go,'  or  '  Stay.'  And  you  will  trust  me ;  and  if  I  say  the  last, 
you  will  submit  ?" 

"  Oh  yes,  sir — yes !" 

*  Words  coined  by  Mr.  Caxton  from  TrXavrjrmoc,  disposed  to  roaming, 
and  tZaWorptuio,  to  export — to  alienate. 


*  ill     CAS  rONS 


CHAPTER  II. 

Tins  compact  made,  my  father  roused  himself  from  all  his 
Btudies — devoted  his  whole  thoughts  to  me — sought  with  all 
his  gentle  wisdom  to  wean  me  imperceptibly  from  my  one  fix- 
ed tyrannical  idea,  —  ranged  through  his  wide  pharmacy  of 
books  for  such  medicaments  as  might  alter  the  system  of  my 
thoughts.  And  little  thought  he  that  his  very  tenderness  and 
wisdom  worked  against  him,  for  at  each  new  instance  of  either 
my  heart  called  aloud,  "  Is  it  not  that  thy  tenderness  may  be 
repaid,  and  thy  wisdom  be  known  abroad,  that  I  go  from  thee 
into  the  strange  land,  O  my  father  !" 

And  the  two  months  expired,  and  my  father  saw  that  the 
magnet  had  turned  unalterably  to  the  loadstone  in  the  great 
Australasian  Bight ;  and  he  said  to  me,  "  Go,  and  comfort  your 
mother.  I  have  told  her  your  wish,  and  authorized  it  by  my 
consent,  for  I  believe  now  that  it  is  for  your  good." 

I  found  my  mother  in  the  little  room  she  had  appropriated 
to  herself  next  my  father's  study.  And  in  that  room  there  was 
a  pathos  which  I  have  no  words  to  express ;  for  my  mother's 
meek,  gentle,  womanly  soul  spoke  there,  so  that  it  was  the 
Home  of  Home.  The  care  with  which  she  had  transplanted 
from  the  brick  house,  and  lovingly  arranged,  all  the  humble 
memorials  of  old  times,  dear  to  her  affections  —  the  black  sil- 
houette of  my  father's  profile  cut  in  paper,  in  the  full  pomp  of 
academics,  cap  and  gown  (how  had  he  ever  consented  to  sit 
for  it !),  framed  and  glazed  in  the  place  of  honour  over  the  lit- 
tle hearth;  and  boyish  sketches  of  mine  at  the  Hellenic  Insti- 
tute, first  essays  in  sepia  and  Indian  ink,  to  animate  the  walls, 
and  bring  her  back,  when  she  sat  there  in  the  twilight,  musing 
alone,  to  sunny  hours,  when  fcisty  and  the  young  mother  threw 
daisies  at  each  other;— and  dbvered  with  a  great  glass  shade, 
and  <lusted  each  day  with  her  own  hand,  the  flower-pot  Sisty 
had  boughl  with  the  proceeds  of  the  domino-box,  on  that 
memorable  occasion  on  which  he  had  learned  "how  bad  deeds 
are'  repaid  with  good."  There, in  one  corner,  stood  the  little 
cottage  piano,  which  I  remembered  all  my  life — old-fashioned, 


A    FAMILY   PICTUKE.  333 

and  with  the  jingling  voice  of  approaching  decrepitude,  but 
still  associated  with  such  melodies  as,  after  childhood,  we  hear 
never  more !  And  in  the  modest  hanging  shelves,  which  look- 
ed so  gay  with  ribbons,  and  tassels,  and  silken  cords  —  my 
mother's  own  library,  saying  more  to  the  heart  than  all  the 
cold  wise  poets  whose  souls  my  father  invoked  in  his  grand 
Heraclea.  The  Bible  over  which,  with  eyes  yet  untaught  to 
read,  I  had  hung  in  vague  awe  and  love,  as  it  lay  open  on  my 
mother's  lap,  while  her  sweet  voice,  then  only  serious,  was 
made  the  oracle  of  its  truths.  And  my  first  lesson-books  were 
there,  all  hoarded.  And  bound  in  blue  and  gold,  but  elabo- 
rately papered  up,  Coicper's  Poems  —  a  gift  from  my  father  in 
the  days  of  courtship — sacred  treasure,  which  not  even  I  had 
the  privilege  to  touch  ;  and  which  my  mother  took  out  only  in 
the  great  crosses  and  trials  of  conjugal  life,  whenever  some 
words  less  kind  than  usual  had  dropped  unawares  from  her 
scholar's  absent  lips.  Ah !  all  these  poor  household  gods,  all 
seemed  to  look  on  me  with  mild  anger ;  and  from  all  came  a 
voice  to  my  soul,  "  Cruel,  dost  thou  forsake  us  !"  And 
amongst  them  sat  my  mother,  desolate  as  Rachel,  and  weep- 
ing silently. 

"  Mother !  mother !"  I  cried,  falling  on  her  neck,  "  forgive 
me — it  is  past — I  cannot  leave  you !" 


CHAPTER  III. 

"  No — no  !  it  is  for  your  good — Austin  says  so.  Go — it  is 
but  the  first  shock." 

Then  to  my  mother  I  opened  the  sluices  of  that  deep  I  had 
concealed  from  scholar  and  soldier.  To  her  I  poured  all  the 
wild,  restless  thoughts  which  wandered  through  the  ruins  of 
love  destroyed — to  her  I  confessed  what  to  myself  I  had 
scarcely  before  avowed.  And  when  the  picture  of  that,  the 
darker,  side  of  my  mind  was  shown,  it  was  with  a  prouder 
face,  and  less  broken  voice,  that  t  spoke  of  the  manlier  hopes 
and  nobler  aims  that  gleamed  across  the  wrecks  and  the  des- 
ert, and  showed  me  my  escape. 

"  Did  you  not  once  say,  mother,  that  you  had  felt  it  like  a 
remorse,  that  my  father's  genius  passed  so  noiselessly  away, 
— half  accusing  the  happiness  you  gave  him  for  the  death  of 


334  THE   CAXT0N8: 

liis  ambition  in  the  contenl  of  his  mind?  Did  you  not  feel  a 
urw  object  in  life  when  the  ambition  revived  at  List,  and  you 
thought  you  heard  the  applause  of  the  world  murmuring  round 
your  scholar's  cell?  Did  you  not  share  in  the  day-dreams 
your  brother  conjured  up,  and  exclaim,  'If  my  brother  could 
be  the  means  of  raising  him  in  the  world!'  and  when  you 
thought  we  had  found  the  way  to  fame  and  fortune,  did  you 
not  sob  out  from  your  full  heart,  '  And  it  is  my  brother  who 
will  pay  back  to  his  son — all — all  he  gave  up  for  me  ?'  " 

"  I  cannot  bear  this,  Sisty ! — cease,  cease !" 

"No;  for  you  do  not  yet  understand  me!  Will  it  not  be 
better  still,  if  your  son — yours — restore  to  your  Austin  all 
that  he  lost,  no  matter  how  ?  If  through  your  son,  mother, 
you  do  indeed  make  the  world  hear  of  your  husband's  genius 
— restore  the  spring  to  his  mind,  the  glory  to  his  pursuits — 
if  you  rebuild  that  vaunted  ancestral  name,  which  is  glory  to 
our  poor  sonless  Roland — if  your  son  can  restore  the  decay  of 
generations,  and  reconstruct  from  the  dust  the  whole  house 
into  which  you  have  entered,  its  meek  presiding  angel  ? — ah, 
mother !  if  this  can  be  done,  it  w^ill  be  your  wTork ;  for  unless 
you  can  share  my  ambition — unless  you  can  dry  those  eyes, 
and  smile  in  my  face,  and  bid  me  go,  with  a  cheerful  voice — 
all  my  courage  melts  from  my  heart,  and  again  I  say,  I  cannot 
leave  you !" 

Then  my  mother  folded  her  arms  round  me,  and  wTe  both 
wept,  and  could  not  speak — but  we  were  both  happy. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

Now  the  wrorst  was  over,  and  my  mother  was  the  most 
heroic  of  us  all.  So  I  began  to  prepare  myself  in  good  earn- 
est, and  I  followed  Trevanion's  instructions  with  a  persever- 
ance which  I  could  never,  at  that  young  day,  have  thrown 
into  the  dead  life  of  books.  I  was  in  a  good  school,  amongst 
our  Cumberland  Bheep-walks,  to  learn  those  simple  elements 
of  rural  art  which  belong  to  the  pastoral  state.  Mr.  Sidney, 
in  Ins  admirable  Australian  Handbook,  recommends  young 
gentlemen  who  think  of  becoming  settlers  in  the  Bush  to 
bivouac  for  three  months  on  Salisbury  Plain.  That  book  wai 
not   then   written,  or  I  might  have  taken  the  advice;  mean- 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  335 

while  I  think,  with  due  respect  to  such  authority,  that  I  went 
through  a  preparatory  training  quite  as  useful  in  seasoning  the 
future  emigrant.  I  associated  readily  with  the  kindly  peas- 
ants and  craftsmen,  who  became  my  teachers.  With  what 
pride  I  presented  my  father  with  a  desk,  and  my  mother  with 
a  workbox,  fashioned  by  my  own  hands !  I  made  Bolt  a  lock 
for  his  plate-chest,  and  (that  last  was  ray  magnum  opus,  my 
great  masterpiece)  I  repaired  and  absolutely  set  going  an  old 
turret-clock  in  the  tower,  that  had  stood  at  2  p.m.  since  the 
memory  of  man.  I  loved  to  think,  each  time  the  hour  sound- 
ed, that  those  who  heard  its  deep  chime  would  remember  me. 
But  the  flocks  were  my  main  care :  the  sheep  that  I  tended 
and  helped  to  shear,  and  the  lamb  that  I  hooked  out  of  the 
great  marsh,  and  the  three  venerable  ewes  that  I  nursed 
through  a  mysterious  sort  of  murrain,  which  puzzled  all  the 
neighbourhood — are  they  not  written  in  thy  loving  chronicles, 
O  House  of  Caxton ! 

And  now,  since  much  of  the  success  of  my  experiment  must 
depend  on  the  friendly  terms  I  could  establish  with  my  in- 
tended partner,  I  wrote  to  Trevanion,  begging  him  to  get  the 
young  gentleman  who  was  to  join  me,  and  whose  capital  I  was 
to  administer,  to  come  and  visit  us.  Trevanion  complied,  and 
there  arrived  a  tall  fellow,  somewhat  more  than  six  feet  high, 
answering  to  the  name  of  Guy  Bolding,  in  a  cut-away  sport- 
ing-coat, with  a  dog- whistle  tied  to  the  button-hole;  drab 
shorts  and  gaiters,  and  a  waistcoat  with  all  manner  of  strange 
furtive  pockets.  Guy  Bolding  had  lived  a  year  and  a  half  at 
Oxford  as  a  "fast  man;"  so  "fast"  had  he  lived,  that  there 
was  scarcely  a  tradesman  at  Oxford  into  whose  books  he  had 
not  contrived  to  run. 

His  father  was  compelled  to  withdraw  him  from  the  uni- 
versity, at  which  he  had  already  had  the  honour  of  being- 
plucked  for  "  the  little  go ;"  and  the  young  gentleman,  on  be- 
ing asked  for  what  profession  he  was  fit,  had  replied  with  con- 
scious pride,  "That  he  could  tool  a  coach!"  In  despair,  the 
sire,  who  owed  his  living  to  Trevanion,  had  asked  the  states- 
man's advice,  and  the  advice  had  fixed  me  with  a  partner  in 
expatriation. 

My  first  feeling  in  greeting  the  "fast"  man  was  certainly 
that  of  deep  disappointment  and  strong  repugnance.  But  I 
was  determined  not  to  be  too  fastidious ;  and  having  a  lucky 


THE    (AXTONS: 

knack  of  Baiting  myself  pretty  well  to  all  tempers  (without 
which  a  man  had  better  not  think  of  loadstones  in  the  great 
Australasian  Bight),  I  contrived  before  the  first  week  was  out 
to  establish  so  many  points  of  connection  between  us,  that  we 
became  the  best  friends  in  the  world.  Indeed,  it  would  have 
been  my  fault  if  we  had  not,  for  Guy  Bolding,  with  all  his 
faults,  was  one  of  those  excellent  creatures  who  are  nobody's 
enemies  but  their  own.  His  good-humour  was  inexhaustible. 
Not  a  hardship  or  privation  came  amiss  to  him.  He  had  a 
phrase  "  Such  fun  !"  that  always  rushed  laughingly  to  his  lips 
when  another  man  would  have  cursed  and  groaned.  If  we  lost 
our  way  in  the  great  trackless  moors,  missed  our  dinner,  and 
were  half  famished,  Guy  rubbed  hands  that  would  have  felled 
an  ox,  and  chuckled  out  "  Such  fun !"  If  we  stuck  in  a  bog, 
if  we  were  caught  in  a  thunder-storm,  if  we  were  pitched  head- 
over-heels  by  the  wild  colts  we  undertook  to  break  in,  Guy 
Bolding' s  sole  elegy  was  "  Such  fun !"  That  grand  shibboleth 
of  philosophy  only  forsook  him  at  the  sight  of  an  open  book. 
I  don't  think  that,  at  that  time,  he  could  have  found  "fun" 
even  in  Don  Quixote.  This  hilarious  temperament  had  no  in- 
ibility ;  a  kinder  heart  never  beat, — but,  to  be  sure,  it  beat 
to  a  strange,  restless,  tarantula  sort  of  measure,  which  kept  it 
in  a  perpetual  dance.  It  made  him  one  of  those  officiously 
good  fellows,  who  are  never  quiet  themselves,  and  never  let 
any  one  else  be  quiet  if  they  can  help  it.  But  Guy's  great 
fault,  in  this  prudent  world,  was  his  absolute  incontinence  of 
money.  If  you  had  turned  a  Euphrates  of  gold  into  his  pock- 
ets at  morning,  it  would  have  been  as  dry  as  the  great  Sahara 
by  twelve  at  noon.  What  he  did  with  the  money  was  a  mys- 
tery as  much  to  himself  as  to  every  one  else.  His  father  said 
in  a  letter  to  me,  that  "he  had  seen  him  shying  at  sparrows 
with  half-crowns!"  That  such  a  young  man  could  come  to  no 
good  in  England  seemed  perfectly  clear.  Still,  it  is  recorded 
of  many  great  men,  who  did  not  end  their  days  in  a  workhouse, 
that  they  were  equally  non-retentive  of  money.  Schiller,  when 
he  had  nothing  else  to  give  away,  gave  the  clothes  from  his 
buck,  and  Goldsmith  the  blankets  from  his  bed.  Tender  hands 
found  it  necessary  to  pick  Beethoven's  pockets  at  home  before 
he  walked  out.  Great  heroes,  who  have  made  no  scruple  of 
robbing  the  whole  world,  have  been  just  as  lavish  as  poor  pods 
-iii<1   musicians.     Alexander,  in  parcelling  out  his  spoils,  left 


A    FAMILY    PICTUKE.  337 

himself  "  hope !"  And  as  for  Julius  Caesar,  he  was  two  mil- 
lions in  debt  when  he  shied  his  last  half-crown  at  the  sparrows 
in  Gaul.  Encouraged  by  these  illustrious  examples,  I  had 
hopes  of  Guy  Holding ;  and  the  more  as  he  was  so  aware  of 
his  own  infirmity  that  he  was  perfectly  contented  with  the 
arrangement  which  made  me  treasurer  of  his  capital,  and  even 
besought  me,  on  no  account,  let  him  beg  ever  so  hard,  to  per- 
mit his  own  money  to  come  in  his  own  way.  In  fact,  I  con- 
trived to  gain  a  great  ascendency  over  his  simple,  generous, 
thoughtless  nature ;  and  by  artful  appeals  to  his  affections — to 
all  he  owed  to  his  father  for  many  bootless  sacrifices,  and  to 
the  duty  of  providing  a  little  dower  for  his  infant  sister,  whose 
meditated  portion  had  half  gone  to  pay  his  college  debts — I  at 
last  succeeded  in  fixing  into  his  mind  an  object  to  save  for. 

Three  other  companions  did  I  select  for  our  Cleruchia. 
The  first  was  the  son  of  our  old  shepherd,  who  had  lately  mar- 
ried, but  was  not  yet  encumbered  with  children, — a  good  shep- 
herd, and  an  intelligent,  steady  fellow.  The  second  was  a  very 
different  character ;  he  had  been  the  dread  of  the  whole  squire- 
archy. A  more  bold  and  dexterous  poacher  did  not  exist. 
Xow  my  acquaintance  with  this  latter  person,  named  "Will 
Peterson,  and  more  popularly  "  Will  o'  the  Wisp,"  had  com- 
menced thus : — Bolt  had  managed  to  rear  in  a  small  copse 
about  a  mile  from  the  house — and  which  was  the  only  bit  of 
ground  in  my  uncle's  domains  that  might  by  courtesy  be  call- 
ed "  a  wood" — a  young  colony  of  pheasants,  that  he  dignified 
by  the  title  of  a  "  preserve."  This  colony  was  audaciously 
spoiled  and  grievously  depopulated,  in  spite  of  two  watchers, 
who,  with  Bolt,  guarded  for  seven  nights  successively  the  slum- 
bers of  the  infant  settlement.  So  insolent  was  the  assault,  that 
bang,  bang,  went  the  felonious  gun — behind,  before — within 
but  a  few  yards  of  the  sentinels — and  the  gunner  was  off*,  and 
the  prey  seized,  before  they  could  rush  to  the  spot.  The  bold- 
ness and  skill  of  the  enemy  soon  proclaimed  him,  to  the  expe- 
rienced watchers,  to  be  Will  o'  the  Wisp ;  and  so  great  was 
their  dread  of  this  fellow's  strength  and  courage,  and  so  com- 
plete their  despair  of  being  a  match  for  his  swiftness  and  cun- 
ning, that  after  the  seventh  night  the  watchers  refused  to  go 
out  any  longer ;  and  poor  Bolt  himself  was  confined  to  his  bed 
by  an  attack  of  what  a  doctor  would  have  called  rheumatism, 
and  a  moralist,  rage.     My  indignation   and   svmpathv  were 

P 


THE  caxtons: 

greatly  excited  by  thifl  mortifying  failure,  and  my  interest  ro- 
mantically  aroused  by  the  anecdotes  I  had  heard  of  Will  o'  the 
Wisp;  accordingly,  armed  with  a  thick  bludgeon,  I  stole  out 
at  night,  and  took  my  way  to  the  copse.  The  leaves  were  not 
off  the  trees,  and  how  the  poacher  contrived  to  see  his  victims 
I  know  not ;  but  five  shots  did  he  fire,  and  not  in  vain,  without 
allowing  me  to  catch  a  glimpse  of  him.  I  then  retreated  to 
the  outskirt  of  the  copse,  and  waited  patiently  by  an  angle, 
which  commanded  two  sides  of  the  wood.  Just  as  the  dawn 
began  to  peep,  I  saw  my  man  emerge  within  twenty  yards  of 
me.  I  held  my  breath,  suffered  him  to  get  a  few  steps  from 
the  wood,  crept  on  so  as  to  intercept  his  retreat,  and  then 
pounce — such  a  bound !  My  hand  was  on  his  shoulder — prr, 
prr, — no  eel  was  ever  more  lubricate.  He  slid  from  me  like  a 
thing  immaterial,  and  wTas  off  over  the  moors  with  a  swiftness 
which  might  well  have  baffled  any  clodhopper — a  race  whose 
calves  are  generally  absorbed  in  the  soles  of  their  hobnail 
shoes.  But  the  Hellenic  Institute,  with  its  classical  gymnasia, 
had  trained  its  pupils  in  all  bodily  exercises ;  and  though  the 
Will  o'  the  Wisp  was  swift  for  a  clodhopper,  he  wTas  no  match 
at  running  for  any  youth  who  has  spent  his  boyhood  in  the  dis- 
cipline of  cricket,  prisoner's  bar,  and  hunt-the-hare.  I  reached 
him  at  length,  and  brought  him  to  bay. 

"Stand  back!"  said  he,  panting,  and  taking  aim  wTith  his 
gun  :  "  it  is  loaded." 

"Yes,"  said  I;  "  but,  though  you're  a  brave  poacher,  you  dare 
not  fire  at  your  fellow-man.     Give  up  the  gun  this  instant." 

My  address  took  him  by  surprise  ;  he  did  not  fire.  I  struck 
up  the  barrel,  and  closed  on  him.  We  grappled  pretty  tight- 
ly, and  in  the  wrestle  the  gun  went  off.  The  man  loosened  his 
hold.  "  Lord  ha'  mercy  !  I  have  not  hurt  you  ?"  he  said,  fal- 
teringly. 

M  My  good  fellow — no,"  said  I ;  "  and  now  let  us  throw  aside 
gun  and  bludgeon,  and  fight  it  out  like  Englishmen,  or  else  let 
us  sit  down  and  talk  over  it  like  friends." 

The  Will  o'  the  Wisp  scratched  its  head  and  laughed. 

u  Well,  you're  a  queer  one!"  quoth  it.  And  the  poacher 
dropped  the  gun  and  sat  down. 

We  did  talk  it  over,  and  I  obtained  Peterson's  promise  to 
reaped  the  preserve  henceforth;  and  we  thereon  grew  so  cor- 
dial that  he  walked  home  with  me,  and  even  presented  me, 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  339 

shyly  and  apologetically,  with  the  five  pheasants  he  had  shot. 
From  that  time  I  sought  him  out.  He  was  a  young  fellow 
not  four-and-twenty,  who  had  taken  to  poaching  from  the  wild 
sport  of  the  thing,  and  from  some  confused  notions  that  he  had 
a  licence  from  Nature  to  poach.  I  soon  found  out  that  he  was  , 
meant  for  better  things  than  to  spend  six  months  of  the  twelve 
in  prison,  and  finish  his  life  on  the  gallows  after  killing  a  game- 
keeper. That  seemed  to  me  his  most  probable  destiny  in  the 
Old  World,  so  I  talked  him  into  a  burning  desire  for  the  New 
one :  and  a  most  valuable  aid  in  the  Bush  he  proved  too. 

My  third  selection  was  in  a  personage  who  could  bring  little 
physical  strength  to  help  us,  but  who  had  more  mind  (though 
with  a  wrong  twist  in  it)  than  both  the  others  put  together. 

A  worthy  couple  in  the  village  had  a  son,  who  being  slight 
and  puny,  compared  to  the  Cumberland  breed,  was  shouldered 
out  of  the  market  of  agricultural  labour,  and  went  off,  yet  a 
boy,  to  a  manufacturing  town.  Now  about  the  age  of  thirty, 
this  mechanic,  disabled  for  his  work  by  a  long  illness,  came 
home  to  recover  ;  and  in  a  short  time  we  heard  of  nothing  but 
the  pestilential  doctrines  with  which  he  was  either  shocking 
or  infecting  our  primitive  villagers.  According  to  report, 
Corcyra  itself  never  engendered  a  democrat  more  awful.  The 
poor  man  was  really  very  ill,  and  his  parents  very  poor ;  but  his 
unfortunate  doctrines  dried  up  all  the  streams  of  charity  that 
usually  flowed  through  our  kindly  hamlet.  The  clergyman  (an 
excellent  man,  but  of  the  old  school)  walked  by  the  house  as  if 
it  were  tabooed.  The  apothecary  said,  "  Miles  Square  ought 
to  have  wine  ;"  but  he  did  not  send  him  any.  The  farmers 
held  his  name  in  execration,  for  he  had  incited  all  their  labour- 
ers to  strike  for  another  shilling  a-week.  And  but  for  the  old 
Tower,  Miles  Square  would  soon  have  found  his  way  to  the 
only  republic  in  which  he  could  obtain  that  democratic  frater- 
nization for  which  he  sighed — the  grave  being,  I  suspect,  the 
sole  commonwealth  which  attains  the  dead  flat  of  social  equali- 
ty that  life  in  its  every  principle  so  heartily  abhors. 

My  uncle  went  to  see  Miles  Square,  and  came  back  the  col- 
our of  purple.  Miles  Square  had  preached  him  a  long  sermon 
on  the  unholiness  of  war.  "  Even  hi  defence  of  your  king  and 
country  ?"  had  roared  the  Captain ;  and  Miles  Square  had  re- 
plied with  a  remark  upon  kings  in  general,  that  the  Captain 
could  not  have  repeated  without  expecting  to  see  the  old  Tow- 


;U0  i  m:  CAXTONS  : 

er  tall  about  his  ears  :  and  with  an  observation  about  the  coun- 
try in  particular,  to  the  effect  that  "  the  country  would  be  much 
better  off  if  it  were  conquered!"  On  hearing  the  report  of 
these  loyal  and  patriotic  replies,  my  father  said  "Papa!"  and, 
roused  out  ofhis  usual  philosophical  indifference,  wenl  himself 
to  visit  Miles  Square.  My  father  returned  as  pale  as  my  uncle 
had  been  purple.  "And  to  think,"  said  he  mournfully,  "that 
in  the  town  whence  this  man  comes,  there  are,  he  tells  me,  ten 
thousand  other  of  God's  creatures  who  speed  the  work  of  civ- 
ilization while  execrating  its  laws!" 

But  neither  father  nor  uncle  made  any  opposition  when,  with 
a  basket  laden  with  wine  and  arrow-root,  and  a  neat  little  Bi- 
ble, bound  in  brown,  my  mother  took  her  way  to  the  excom- 
municated cottage.  Her  visit  was  as  signal  a  failure  as  those 
that  preceded  it.  Miles  Square  refused  the  basket;  "he  was 
not  going  to  accept  alms,  and  eat  the  bread  of  charity ;"  and 
on  my  mother  meekly  suggesting  that,  "  if  Mr.  Miles  Square 
would  condescend  to  look  into  the  Bible,  he  would  see  that 
even  charity  was  no  sin  in  giver  or  recipient,"  Mr.  Miles  Square 
had  undertaken  to  prove,  "  that,  according  to  the  Bible,  he  had 
as  much  a  right  to  my  mother's  property  as  she  had — that  all 
things  should  be  in  common — and,  when  all  things  were  in 
common,  what  became  of  charity  ?  No  ;  he  could  not  eat  my 
uncle's  arrow-root,  and  drink  his  wine,  while  my  uncle  was  im- 
properly withholding  from  him  and  his  fellow-creatures  so  many 
unprofitable  acres :  the  land  belonged  to  the  people."  It  was 
now  the  turn  of  Pisistratus  to  go.  He  went  once,  and  he  went 
often.  Miles  Square  and  Pisistratus  wrangled  and  argued — 
argued  and  wrangled — and  ended  by  taking  a  fancy  to  each 
other ;  for  this  poor  Miles  Square  was  not  half  so  bad  as  his 
doctrines.  His  errors  arose  from  intense  sympathy  with  the 
sufferings  he  had  witnessed,  amidst  the  misery  which  accom- 
panies the  reign  of  millocratism,  and  from  the  vague  aspira- 
tions of  a  half-taught,  impassioned,  earnest  nature.  By  degrees, 
I  persuaded  him  to  drink  the  wine  and  eat  the  arrow-root,  en 
attendant  that  millennium  which  was  to  restore  the  land  to  the 
people.  And  then  my  mother  came  again  and  softened  his 
h<  art,  and,  for  the  iirst  time  in  his  life,  let  into  its  cold  crotch- 
eta  the  warm  light  of  human  gratitude.  I  lent  him  some  books, 
amongsl  others  a  few  volumes  on  Australia.  A  passage  in  one 
of  the  latter,  in  which  it  was  said  "that  an  intelligent  mechanic 


A    FAMILY    PICTUEE.  341 

usually  made  his  way  in  the  colony,  even  as  a  shepherd,  better 
than  a  dull  agricultural  labourer,"  caught  hold  of  his  fancy,  and 
seduced  his  aspirations  into  a  healthful  direction.  Finally,  as 
he  recovered,  he  entreated  me  to  let  him  accompany  me.  And 
as  I  may  not  have  to  return  to  Miles  Square,  I  think  it  right 
here  to  state,  that  he  did  go  with  me  to  Australia,  and  did 
succeed,  first  as  a  shepherd,  next  as  a  superintendent,  and  final- 
ly, on  saving  money,  as  a  landowner ;  and  that,  in  spite  of  his 
opinions  of  the  unholiness  of  war,  he  was  no  sooner  in  posses- 
sion of  a  comfortable  log  homestead,  than  he  defended  it  with 
uncommon  gallantry  against  an  attack  of  the  aborigines,  whose 
right  to  the  soil  was,  to  say  the  least  of  it,  as  good  as  his  claim 
to  my  uncle's  acres ;  that  he  commemorated  his  subsequent  ac- 
quisition of  a  fresh  allotment,  with  the  stock  on  it,  by  a  little 
pamphlet,  published  at  Sydney,  on  the  Sanctity  of  the  Rights 
of  Property ;  and  that,  when  I  left  the  colony,  having  been 
much  pestered  by  two  refractory  "  helps"  that  he  had  added 
to  his  establishment,  he  had  just  distinguished  himself  by  a 
very  anti-levelling  lecture  upon  the  duties  of  servants  to  their 
employers.     What  would  the  Old  >Yorld  have  done  for  this 


CHAPTER  Y. 

I  had  not  been  in  haste  to  conclude  my  arrangements,  for, 
independently  of  my  wish  to  render  myself  acquainted  with 
the  small  useful  crafts  that  might  be  necessary  to  me  in  a  life 
that  makes  the  individual  man  a  state  in  himself,  I  naturally 
desired  to  habituate  my  kindred  to  the  idea  of  our  separation, 
and  to  plan  and  provide  for  them  all  such  substitutes  or  dis- 
tractions, in  compensation  for  my  loss,  as  my  fertile  imagina- 
tion could  suggest.  At  first,  for  the  sake  of  Blanche,  Roland, 
and  my  mother,  I  talked  the  Captain  into  reluctant  sanction  of 
his  sister-in-law's  proposal,  to  unite  their  incomes  and  share 
alike,  without  considering  which  party  brought  the  larger  pro- 
portion into  the  firm.  I  represented  to  him  that,  unless  he 
made  that  sacrifice  of  his  pride,  my  mother  would  be  wholly 
without  those  little  notable  uses  and  objects,  those  small  house- 
hold pleasures,  so  dear  to  woman  ;  that  all  society  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood would  be  impossible,  and  that  my  mother's  time 


3  12  THE   CAXTONS  : 

would  hang  so  heavily  on  her  hands,  that  her  only  resource 
would  be  to  muse  on  the  absenl  one,  and  fret.  Nay,  if*  Ik-  per- 
sisted in  so  false  a  pride,]  told  him, fairly, thai  I  should  urge 
my  father  to  leave  the  Tower.  These  representations  succeed- 
ed, and  hospitality  had  commenced  in  the  old  hall,  and  a  knot 
of  gossips  had  centred  round  my  mother — groups  of  laughing 
children  had  relaxed  the  still  brow  of  Blanche — and  the  Cap- 
tain himself  was  a  more  cheerful  and  social  man.  My  next 
point  was  to  engage  my  father  in  the  completion  of  the  Great 
Hook.  "  Ah,  sir,"  said  I,  "  give  me  an  inducement  to  toil,  a 
reward  for  my  industry.  Let  me  think,  in  each  tempting 
pleasure,  each  costly  vice — No,  no  ;  I  will  save  for  the  Great 
Book  !  and  the  memory  of  the  father  shall  still  keep  the  son 
from  error.  Ah,  look  you,  sir!  Mr.Trevanion  offered  me  the 
loan  of  the  £1500  necessary  to  commence  with  ;  but  you  gen- 
erously and  at  once  said — '  No ;  you  must  not  begin  life  under 
the  load  of  debt.'  And  I  knew  you  were  right  and  yielded — 
yielded  the  more  gratefully  that  I  could  not  but  forfeit  some- 
thing of  the  just  pride  of  manhood  in  incurring  such  an  obliga- 
tion to  the  father  of — Miss  Trevanion.  Therefore  I  have  taken 
that  sum  from  you — a  sum  that  would  almost  have  sufficed  to 
establish  your  younger  and  worthier  child  in  the  world  for 
ever.  To  that  child  let  me  repay  it,  otherwise  I  will  not  take 
it.  Let  me  hold  it  as  a  trust  for  the  Great  Book ;  and  promise 
me  that  the  Great  Book  shall  be  ready  when  your  wanderer 
returns,  and  accounts  for  the  missing  talent." 

And  my  father  pished  a  little,  and  rubbed  off  the  dew  that 
had  gathered  on  his  spectacles.  But  I  would  not  leave  him  in 
peace  till  he  had  given  me  his  word  that  the  Great  Book 
should  go  on  apas  du  giant — nay,  till  I  had  seen  him  sit  down 
to  it  with  good  heart,  and  the  wheel  went  round  again  in  the 
quiet  mechanism  of  that  gentle  life. 

Finally,  and  as  the  culminating  acme  of  my  diplomacy,  I  ef- 
fected the  purchase  of  the  neighbouring  apothecary's  practice 
and  good-will  for  Squills,  upon  terms  which  he  willingly  sub- 
scribed  to;  for  the  poor  man  had  pined  at  the  loss  of  his  fa- 
vourite patients,  though,  Heaven  knows,  they  did  not  add 
much  to  his  income.  And  as  for  my  lather,  there  Avas  no  man 
who  diverted  him   more  than  Squills,  though  he  accused  him 

of  being  a  materialist,  and  set  his  whole  spiritual  pack  of  sages 
to  worry  and  bark  at  him,  from  Plato  and  Zeno  to  Reid  and 
Abraham  Tucker. 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  343 

Thus,  although  I  have  very  loosely  intimated  the  flight  of 
time,  more  than  a  whole  year  elapsed  from  the  date  of  our  set- 
tlement at  the  Tower  and  that  fixed  for  my  departure. 

In  the  meanwhile,  despite  the  rarity  amongst  us  of  that 
phenomenon,  a  newspaper,  we  were  not  so  utterly  cut  off  from 
the  sounds  of  the  far-booming  world  beyond,  but  what  the  in- 
telligence of  a  change  in  the  administration  and  the  appoint- 
ment of  Mr.  Trevanion  to  one  of  the  great  offices  of  state  reach- 
ed our  ears.  I  had  kept  up  no  correspondence  with  Trevanion 
subsequent  to  the  letter  that  occasioned  Guy  Bolding's  visit ; 
I  wrote  now  to  congratulate  him :  his  reply  was  short  and 
hurried. 

An  intelligence  that  startled  me  more,  and  more  deeply 
moved  my  heart,  was  conveyed  to  me,  some  three  months  or 
so  before  my  departure,  by  Trevanion's  steward.  The  ill- 
health  of  Lord  Castleton  had  deferred  his  marriage,  intended 
originally  to  be  celebrated  as  soon  as  he  arrived  of  age.  He 
left  the  university  with  the  honours  of  "  a  double  first  class  ;" 
and  his  constitution  appeared  to  rally  from  the  effects  of  stud- 
ies more  severe  to  him  than  they  might  have  been  to  a  man  of 
quicker  and  more  brilliant  capacities — when  a  feverish  cold, 
caught  at  a  county  meeting,  in  which  his  first  public  appear- 
ance was  so  creditable  as  fully  to  justify  the  warmest  hopes  of 
his  party,  produced  inflammation  of  the  lungs,  and  ended  fatal- 
ly. The  startling  contrast  forced  on  my  mind — here,  sudden 
death  and  cold  clay — there,  youth  in  its  first  flower,  princely 
rank,  boundless  wealth,  the  sanguine  expectation  of  an  illustri- 
ous career,  and  the  prospect  of  that  happiness  which  smiled 
from  the  eyes  of  Fanny  —  that  contrast  impressed  me  with  a 
strange  awe  :  death  seems  so  near  to  us  when  it  strikes  those 
whom  life  most  flatters  and  caresses.  Whence  is  that  curious 
sympathy  that  we  all  have  with  the  possessors  of  worldly 
greatness,  when  the  hour-glass  is  shaken  and  the  scythe  de- 
scends ?  If  the  famous  meeting  between  Diogenes  and  Alex- 
ander had  taken  place  not  before,  but  after  the  achievements 
which  gave  to  Alexander  the  name  of  Great,  the  cynic  would 
not,  perhaps,  have  envied  the  hero  his  pleasures  nor  his  splen- 
dours— neither  the  charms  of  Statira  nor  the  tiara  of  the 
Mede  ;  but  if,  the  day  after,  a  cry  had  gone  forth,  "  Alexander 
the  Great  is  dead !"  verily  I  believe  that  Diogenes  would  have 
coiled  himself  up  in  his  tub,  and  felt  that  with  the  shadow  of 


344  THE   CAXTONS  : 

tin-  Btately  hero,  Bomething  of  glory  and  of  warmth  had  gone 
from  that  Bun,  which  it  should  darken  never  more.  In  the  na- 
ture of  man,  the  humblest  or  the  hardest,  there  is  a  something 

that  lives  in  all  of  the  Beautiful  or  the  Fortunate,  which  hope 
and  desire  have  appropriated,  even  in  the  vanities  of  a  childish 
dream. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

"  Why  are  you  here  all  alone,  cousin  ?  How  cold  and  still 
it  is  amongst  the  graves  !" 

"Sit  down  beside  me,  Blanche;  it  is  not  colder  in  the 
churchyard  than  on  the  village  green." 

And  Blanche  sat  down  beside  me,  nestled  close  to  me,  and 
leant  her  head  upon  my  shoulder.  We  were  both  long  silent. 
It  was  an  evening  in  the  early  spring,  clear  and  serene — the 
roseate  streaks  were  fading  gradually  from  the  dark  gray  of 
long,  narrow,  fantastic  clouds.  Tall,  leafless  poplars,  that  stood 
in  orderly  level  line,  on  the  lowland  between  the  churchyard 
and  the  hill,  with  its  crown  of  ruins,  left  their  sharp  summits 
distinct  against  the  sky.  But  the  shadows  coiled  dull  and 
heavy  round  the  evergreens  that  skirted  the  churchyard,  so 
that  their  outline  was  vague  and  confused ;  and  there  was  a 
depth  in  that  lonely  stillness,  broken  only  when  the  thrush  flew 
cut  from  the  lower  bushes,  and  the  thick  laurel  leaves  stirred 
reluctantly,  and  again  were  rigid  in  repose.  There  is  a  certain 
melancholy  in  the  evenings  of  early  spring,  which  is  among 
those  influences  of  Nature  the  most  universally  recognized,  the 
most  difficult  to  explain.  The  silent  stir  of  reviving  life,  which 
does  not  yet  betray  signs  in  the  bud  and  blossom — only  in  a 
softer  clearness  in  the  air,  a  more  lingering  pause  in  the  slowly 
Lengthening  day;  a  more  delicate  freshness  and  balm  in  the 
1  wilight  atmosphere ;  a  more  lively,  yet  still  unquiet  note  from 
the  birds,  settling  down  into  their  coverts; — the  Vague  sense 
i  oder  all  that  hush,  which  still  outwardly  wears  the  bleak 
ility  of  winter — of  the  busy  change,  hourly,  momently,  at 
work — renewing  the  youth  of  the  world,  reclothing  with  vig- 
orous bloom  the  skeletons  of  things — all  these  messages  from 
the  heart  of  Nature  to  the  heart  of  Man — may  well  affect  and 
move  us.     But  why  with  melancholy?     No  thought  on  our 


A    FAMILY    PICTUKE.  345 

part  connects  and  construes  the  low,  gentle  voices.  It  is  not 
thought  that  replies  and  reasons :  it  is  feeling  that  hears  and 
dreams.  Examine  not,  O  child  of  man! — examine  not  that 
mysterious  melancholy  with  the  hard  eyes  of  thy  reason ;  thou 
canst  not  impale  it  on  the  spikes  of  thy  thorny  logic,  nor 
describe  its  enchanted  circle  by  problems  conned  from  thy 
schools.  Borderer  thyself  of  two  worlds — the  Dead  and  the 
Living — give  thine  ear  to  the  tones,  bow  thy  soul  to  the  shad- 
ows, that  steal,  in  the  Season  of  Change,  from  the  dim  Border 
Land. 

Blanche  (in  a  whisper). — "What  are  you  thinking  of? — 
speak,  pray!1' 

Pisistratus. — "  I  was  not  thinking,  Blanche ;  or,  if  I  were, 
the  thought  is  gone  at  the  mere  effort  to  seize  or  detain  it." 

Blanche  (after  a  pause). — "  I  know  what  you  mean.  It  is 
the  same  with  me  often — so  often,  when  I  am  sitting  by  my- 
self, quite  still.  It  is  just  like  the  story  Primmins  was  telling 
us  the  other  evening,  '  how  there  was  a  woman  in  her  village 
who  saw  things  and  people  in  a  piece  of  crystal  not  bigger 
than  my  hand  :*  they  passed  along  as  large  as  life,  but  they 
were  only  pictures  in  the  crystal.'  Since  I  heard  the  story, 
when  aunt  asks  me  what  I  am  thinking  of,  I  long  to  say, '  I'm 
not  thinking !     I  am  seeing  pictures  in  the  crystal !' " 

Pisisteatus.— " Tell  my  father  that;  it  will  please  him. 
There  is  more  philosophy  in  it  than  you  are  aware  of,  Blanche. 
There  are  wise  men  who  have  thought  the  whole  world,  its 
'pride,  pomp,  and  circumstance,'  only  a  phantom  image — a 
picture  in  the  crystal." 

Blanche. — "  And  I  shall  see  you — see  us  both,  as  we  are 
sitting  here — and  that  star  which  has  just  risen  yonder — see 
it  all  in  my  crystal — when  you  are  gone!  —  gone,  cousin!" 
(And  Blanche's  head  drooped.) 

*  In  primitive  villages,  in  the  west  of  England,  the  belief  that  the  absent 
may  be  seen  in  a  piece  of  crystal  is,  or  was  many  years  ago,  by  no  means 
an  uncommon  superstition.  I  have  seen  more  than  one  of  these  magic  mir- 
rors, which  Spenser,  by  the  way,  has  beautifully  described.  They  are  about 
the  size  and  shape  of  a  swan's  egg.  It  is  not  every  one,  however,  who  can 
be  a  crystallizer ;  like  second-sight,  it  is  a  special  gift.  N.B. — Since  the 
above  note  (appended  to  the  first  edition  of  this  work)  was  written,  crystals 
and  crystal-seers  have  become  very  familiar  to  those  who  interest  themselves 
in  speculations  upon  the  disputed  phenomena  ascribed  to  Mesmerical  Clair- 
voyance. 

P2 


:;  h;  in  i:   UAXTON8. 

There  waa  something  bo  quiel  and  deep  in  the  tenderness 
of  this  poor  motherless  child,  thai  it  did  not  affect  one  super- 
ficially, Like  a  child's  loud  momentary  affection,  in  which  we 
know  thai  the  first  toy  will  replace  us.  I  kissed  my  little  cous- 
in's pale  face,  and  said,  "  And  I  too,  Blanche,  have  my  crystal; 
and  when  1  consult  it,  I  shall  be  very  angry  if  I  see  you  sad 
and  fretting,  or  seated  alone.  For  you  must  know,  Blanche, 
that  that  is  all  selfishness.  God  made  us,  not  to  indulge  only 
in  crystal  pictures,  weave  idle  fancies,  pine  alone,  and  mourn 
over  what  we  cannot  help — but  to  be  alert  and  active — givers 
of  happiness.  Now,  Blanche,  see  what  a  trust  I  am  going  to 
bequeath  you.  You  are  to  supply  my  place  to  all  whom  I 
leave.  You  are  to  bring  sunshine  wherever  you  glide  with 
that  shy,  soft  step — whether  to  your  father,  when  you  see  his 
brows  knit  and  his  arms  crossed  (that,  indeed,  you  always  do), 
or  to  mine,  when  the  volume  drops  from  his  hand — when  he 
walks  to  and  fro  the  room,  restless,  and  murmuring  to  him- 
self— then  you  are  to  steal  up  to  him,  put  your  hand  in  his, 
lead  him  back  to  his  books,  and  whisper,  'What  will  Sisty  say 
if  his  younger  brother,  the  Great  Book,  is  not  grown  up  when 
he  comes  back?' — And  my  poor  mother,  Blanche! — ah,  how 
can  I  counsel  you  there — how  tell  you  where  to  find  comfort 
for  her  ?  Only,  Blanche,  steal  into  her  heart  and  be  her  daugh- 
ter. And,  to  fulfil  this  threefold  trust,  you  must  not  content 
yourself  with  seeing  pictures  in  the  crystal — do  you  under- 
stand me?" 

"  Oh  yes,"  said  Blanche,  raising  her  eyes,  while  the  tears 
rolled  from  them,  and  folding  her  arms  resolutely  on  her  breast. 

"  And  so,"  said  I,  "  as  we  two,  sitting  in  this  quiet  burial- 
ground,  take  new  heart  for  the  duties  and  cares  of  life,  so  see, 
Blanche,  how  the  stars  come  out,  one  by  one,  to  smile  upon 
us;  for  they,  too,  glorious  orbs  as  they  are,  perform  their  ap- 
pointed ia>ks.  Things  seem  to  approximate  to  God  in  propor- 
tion to  their  vitality  and  movement.  Of  all  things,  least  inert 
and  sullen  should  be  the  soul  of  man.  How  the  grass  grows 
up  over  the  very  grave — quickly  it  grows  and  greenly — but 
neither  so  quick  nor  so  green,  my  Blanche,  as  hope  and  com- 
fort from  human  sorrows." 


PART  FOURTEENTH. 

CHAPTER  I. 

There  is  a  beautiful  and  singular  passage  in  Dante  (which 
has  not  perhaps  attracted  the  attention  it  deserves),  wherein 
the  stern  Florentine  defends  Fortune  from  the  popular  accusa- 
tions against  her.  According  to  him,  she  is  an  angelic  power 
appointed  by  the  Supreme  Being  to  direct  and  order  the  course 
of  human  splendours ;  she  obeys  the  will  of  God ;  she  is  bless- 
ed, and,  hearing  not  those  who  blaspheme  her,  calm  and  aloft 
amongst  the  other  angelic  powers,  revolves  her  spheral  course, 
and  rejoices  in  her  beatitude.* 

This  is  a  conception  very  different  from  the  popular  notion 
which  Aristophanes,  in  his  true  instinct  of  things  popular,  ex- 
presses by  the  sullen  lips  of  his  Plutus.  That  deity  accounts 
for  his  blindness  by  saying,  that  "  when  a  boy,  he  had  indis- 
creetly promised  to  visit  only  the  good,"  and  Jupiter  was  so 
envious  of  the  good  that  he  blinded  the  poor  money-god. 
Whereon  Chremylus  asks  him,  whether,  "  if  he  recovered  his 
sight,  he  would  frequent  the  company  of  the  good  ?"  "  Cer- 
tainly," quoth  Plutus,  "  for  I  have  not  seen  them  ever  so  long." 
"Nor  I  either,"  rejoins  Chremylus  pithily,  "for  all  I  can  see 
out  of  both  eyes." 

But  that  misanthropical  answer  of  Chremylus  is  neither  here 
nor  there,  and  only  diverts  us  from  the  real  question,  and  that 
is,  "Whether  Fortune  be  a  heavenly,  Christian  angel,  or  a 
blind,  blundering  old  heathen  deity  ?"  For  my  part,  I  hold 
with  Dante — for  which,  if  I  were  so  pleased,  or  if,  at  this  period 
of  my  memoirs,  I  had  half-a-dozen  pages  to  spare,  I  could  give 
many  good  reasons.  One  thing,  however,  is  quite  clear — that, 
whether  Fortune  be  more  like  Plutus  or  an  angel,  it  is  no  use 
abusing  her — one  may  as  wTell  throw  stones  at  a  star.     And  I 

*  Dante  here  evidently  associates  Fortune  with  the  planetary  influences  of 
judicial  astrology.  It  is  doubtful  whether  Schiller  ever  read  Dante;  but  in 
one  of  his  most  thoughtful  poems  he  undertakes  the  same  defence  of  Fortune, 
making  the  Fortunate  a  part  of  the  Beautiful. 


l HE   tax  ions  : 

think  if  one  looked  narrowly  at  her  operations,  one  might  per- 

<■  that  Bhe  gives  every  man  a  chance,  at  least  once  in  his 

life;  it'  he  take  and  make  the  best  of  it,  she  will  renew  her 

visits;  if  nut,  Uur  ad  astral    And  therewith  I  am  reminded 

d  incident  quaintly  narrated  by  Mariana  in  his  "History 

Spain,"  how  the  army  of  the  Spanish  kings  got  out  of  a  sad 
hobble  among  the  mountains  at  the  Pass  of  Losa,  by  the  help 
of  a  shepherd,  who  showed  them  the  way.  "  But,"  saith  Ma- 
riana, parenthetically,  "  some  do  say  the  shepherd  was  an 
angel ;  for,  after  he  had  shown  the  way,  he  was  never  seen 
more."  That  is,  the  angelic  nature  of  the  guide  was  proved 
by  being  only  once  seen,  and,  after  having  got  the  army  out 
of  the  hobble,  leaving  it  to  fight  or  run  away,  as  it  had  most 
mind  to.  Now  I  look  upon  that  shepherd,  or  angel,  as  a  very 
good  type  of  my  fortune  at  least.  The  apparition  showed  me 
my  way  in  the  rocks  to  the  great  "Battle  of  Lite;"  after  that, 
— hold  fast  and  strike  hard ! 

Behold  me  in  London  with  Uncle  Roland.  My  poor  parents 
naturally  wished  to  accompany  me,  and  take  the  last  glimpse 
of  the  adventurer  on  board  ship ;  but  I,  knowing  that  the  part- 
ing would  seem  less  dreadful  to  them  by  the  hearthstone,  and 
while  they  could  say,  "  He  is  with  Roland — he  is  not  yet  gone 
from  the  land" — insisted  on  their  staying  behind;  and  thus 
the  farewell  was  spoken.  But  Roland,  the  old  soldier,  had  so 
many  practical  instructions  to  give — could  so  help  me  in  the 
choice  of  the  outfit,  and  the  preparations  for  the  voyage,  that 
I  could  not  refuse  his  companionship  to  the  last.  Guy  Bold- 
ing,  who  had  gone  to  take  leave  of  his  father,  was  to  join  me 
in  town,  as  well  as  my  humbler  Cumberland  colleagues. 

As  my  uncle  and  I  were  both  of  one  mind  upon  the  question 
of  economy,  we  took  up  our  quarters  at  a  lodging-house  in  the 
City ;  and  there  it  was  that  1^  first  made  acquaintance  with  a 
part  of  London  of  which  few  of  my  politer  readers  even  pre- 
tend to  be  cognizant.  I  do  not  mean  any  sneer  at  the  City  it- 
self, my  dear  alderman  ;  that  jest  is  worn  out.  I  am  not  allud- 
ing to  streets,  courts,  and  lanes ;  what  I  mean  may  be  seen  at 
the  West-end — not  so  well  as  at  the  East,  but  still  seen  very 
fairly  !     I  mean — the  House-tops  ! 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  349 


CHAPTER  II. 

BEING   A   CHAPTER    OX   HOUSE-TOPS. 

The  house-tops!  what  a  soberizing  effect  that  prospect 
produces  on  the  mind !  But  a  great  many  requisites  go  to- 
wards the  selection  of  the  right  point  of  survey.  It  is  not 
enough  to  secure  a  lodging  in  the  attic;  you  must  not  be 
fobbed  off  with  a  front  attic  that  faces  the  street.  First,  your 
attic  must  be  unequivocally  a  back  attic ;  secondly,  the  house 
in  which  it  is  located  must  be  slightly  elevated  above  its  neigh- 
bours ;  thirdly,  the  window  must  not  lie  slant  on  the  roof,  as 
is  common  with  attics — in  which  case  you  only  catch  a  peep 
of  that  leaden  canopy  which  infatuated  Londoners  call  the  sky 
— but  must  be  a  window  perpendicular,  and  not  half  blocked 
up  by  the  parapets  of  that  fosse  called  the  gutter ;  and,  lastly, 
the  sight  must  be  so  humoured  that  you  cannot  catch  a  glimpse 
of  the  pavements :  if  you  once  see  the  world  beneath,  the 
whole  charm  of  the  world  above  is  destroyed.  Taking  it  for 
granted  that  you  have  secured  these  requisites,  open  your 
window,  lean  your  chin  on  both  hands,  the  elbows  propped 
commodiously  on  the  sill,  and  contemplate  the  extraordinary 
scene  which  spreads  before  you.  You  find  it  difficult  to  be- 
lieve life  can  be  so  tranquil  on  high,  while  it  is  so  noisy  and 
turbulent  below.  What  astonishing  stillness  !  Eliot  Warbur- 
ton  (seductive  enchanter !)  recommends  you  to  sail  down  the 
Kile  if  you  want  to  lull  the  vexed  spirit.  It  is  easier  and 
cheaper  to  hire  an  attic  in  Holborn !  You  don't  have  the 
crocodiles,  but  you  have  annuals  no  less  hallowed  in  Egypt — 
the  cats !  And  how  harmoniously  the  tranquil  creatures  blend 
with  the  prospect — how  noiselessly  they  glide  along  at  the 
distance,  pause,  peer  about,  and  disappear !  It  is  only  from 
the  attic  that  you  can  appreciate  the  picturesque  which  belongs 
to  our  domesticated  tigerkin !  The  goat  should  be  seen  on 
the  Alps,  and  the  cat  on  the  house-top. 

By  degrees,  the  curious  eye  takes  the  scenery  in  detail :  and 
first,  what  fantastic  variety  in  the  heights  and  shapes  of  the 
chimney-pots !     Some  all  level  in  a  row,  uniform  and  respect- 


350  i  in:   CAXTONS  : 

able,  but  quite  uninteresting;  others,  again,  rising  out  of  nil 
proportion,  and  imperatively  tasking  the  reason  to  conjecture 
why  they  arc  so  aspiring.  Reason  answers  that  it  is  but  a 
homely  expedient  to  give  freer  vent  to  the  smoke;  wherewith 
Imagination  steps  in,  and  represents  to  you  all  the  fretting, 
and  finning,  and  worry,  and  care,  which  the  owners  of  that 
chimney,  now  the  tallest  of  all,  endured,  before,  by  building  it 
higher,  they  got  rid  of  the  vapours.  You  see  the  distress  of 
the  cook,  when  the  sooty  invader  rushed  down,  "like  a  wolf 
on  the  fold,"  full  spring  on  the  Sunday  joint.  You  hear  the 
exclamations  of  the  mistress  (perhaps  a  bride — house  newly 
furnished)  when,  with  white  apron  and  cap,  she  ventured  into 
the  drawing-room,  and  was  straightway  saluted  by  a  joyous 
dance  of  those  monads  called  vulgarly  smuts.  You  feel  man- 
ly indignation  at  the  brute  of  a  bridegroom,  who  rushes  out 
from  the  door,  with  the  smuts  dancing  after  him,  and  swears, 
"  Smoked  out  again !  By  the  Arch-smoker  himself,  I'll  go  and 
dine  at  the  club !"  All  this  might  well  have  been,  till  the 
chimney-pot  was  raised  a  few  feet  nearer  heaven ;  and  now 
perhaps  that  long-sufTering  family  owns  the  happiest  home  in 
the  Row.  Such  contrivances  to  get  rid  of  the  smoke !  It  is 
not  every  one  who  merely  heightens  his  chimney ;  others  clap 
on  the  hollow  tormentor  all  sorts  of  odd  headgear  and  cowls. 
Here,  patent  contrivances  act  the  purpose  of  weather-cocks, 
swaying  to  and  fro  with  the  wind ;  there,  others  stand  as  fix- 
ed as  if,  by  a  "  sicjubeo"  they  had  settled  the  business.  But 
of  all  those  houses  that,  in  the  street,  one  passes  by,  unsus- 
picious of  what's  the  matter  within,  there  is  not  one  in  a  hund- 
red but  what  there  has  been  the  devil  to  do,  to  cure  the  chim- 
neys of  smoking !  At  that  reflection,  Philosophy  dismisses  the 
Bubject,  and  decides  that,  whether  one  lives  in  a  hut  or  a  palace, 
the  first  thing  to  do  is  to  look  to  the  hearth — and  get  rid  of 
the  vapours. 

New  beauties  demand  us.  What  endless  undulations  in  the 
various  declivities  and  ascents;  here  a  slant,  there  a  zigzag! 
With  what  majestic  disdain  yon  roof  rises  up  to  the  left! 
Doubtless  a  palace  of  Genii  or  Gin  (which  last  is  the  proper 
Arabic  word  for  those  builders  of  halls  out  of  nothing,  em- 
ployed by  Aladdin).  Seeing  only  the  roof  of  that  palace  bold- 
ly breaking  the  sky-line — how  serene  your  contemplations! 
Perhaps  a  star  twinkles  over  it,  and  you  muse  on  soft  eyes 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  351 

far  away ;  while  below  at  the  threshold. — No,  phantoms !  we 
see  you  not  from  our  attic.  Note,  yonder,  that  precipitous 
fall — how  ragged  and  jagged  the  roof-scene  descends  in  a 
gorge.  He  who  would  travel  on  foot  through  the  pass  of  that 
defile,  of  which  we  see  but  the  picturesque  summits,  stops  his 
nose,  averts  his  eyes,  guards  his  pockets,  and  hurries  along 
through  the  squalor  of  the  grim  London  lazzaroni.  But,  seen 
above,  what  a  noble  break  in  the  sky-line !  It  would  be  sacri- 
lege to  exchange  that  fine  gorge  for  the  dead  flat  of  dull  roof- 
tops. Look  here — how  delightful ! — that  desolate  house  with 
no  roof  at  all — gutted  and  skinned  by  the  last  London  fire ! 
You  can  see  the  poor  green-and-white  paper  still  clinging  to 
the  walls,  and  the  chasm  that  once  was  a  cupboard,  and  the 
shadows  gathering  black  on  the  aperture  that  once  was  a 
hearth !  Seen  below,  how  quickly  you  would  cross  over  the 
way !  That  great  crack  forebodes  an  avalanche ;  you  hold 
your  breath,  not  to  bring  it  down  on  your  head.  But,  seen 
above,  what  a  compassionate,  inquisitive  charm  in  the  skeleton 
ruin !  How  your  fancy  runs  riot — repeopling  the  chambers, 
hearing  the  last  cheerful  good-night  of  that  destined  Pompeii 
— creeping  on  tiptoe  with  the  mother,  when  she  gives  her  fare- 
well look  to  the  baby.  Now  all  is  midnight  and  silence ;  then 
the  red,  crawling  serpent  comes  out.  Lo !  his  breath ;  hark ! 
his  hiss.  Now,  spire  after  spire  he  winds  and  he  coils ;  now 
he  soars  up  erect — crest  superb,  and  forked  tongue — the  beau- 
tiful horror !  Then  the  start  from  the  sleep,  and  the  doubtful 
awaking,  and  the  run  here  and  there,  and  the  mother's  rush  to 
the  cradle ;  the  cry  from  the  window,  and  the  knock  at  the 
door,  and  the  spring  of  those  on  high  towards  the  stair  that 
leads  to  safety  below,  and  the  smoke  rushing  up  like  the  surge 
of  a  hell !  And  they  run  back  stifled  and  blinded,  and  the  floor 
heaves  beneath  them  like  a  bark  on  the  sea.  Hark !  the  grat- 
ing  wheels  thundering  below ;  near  and  nearer  comes  the  en- 
gine. Fix  the  ladders ! — there !  there  !  at  the  window,  where 
the  mother  stands  with  the  babe  !  Splash  and  hiss  comes  the 
water ;  pales,  then  flares  out,  the  fire :  foe  defies  foe ;  element, 
element.  How  sublime  is  the  war!  But  the  ladder,  the  lad- 
der ! — there,  at  the  window!  All  else  are  saved:  the  clerk 
and  his  books!  the  lawyer  with  that  tin  box  of  title  deeds; 
the  landlord,  with  his  policy  of  insurance  ;  the  miser,  with  his 
bank-notes  and  gold :  all  are  saved — all,  but  the  babe  and  the 


THE    CAXTONS  ', 

mother.     What   a  crowd  in  the  streets!  how  the  light  crim- 

Bona  over  the  gazers,  hundreds  on  hundreds!     All  those  faces 

□  as  one  face,  with  fear.     Not  a  man  mounts  the  ladder. 

5Tes,  there! — gallant  fellow!     God  inspires — God  shall  speed 

thee!  I  low  plainly  I  see  him!  his  eyes  are  closed,  his  teeth 
set .  The  serpent  leaps  up,  the  forked  tongue  darts  upon  him, 
and  the  reek  of  the  breath  wraps  him  round.  The  crowd  has 
ebbed  back  like  a  sea,  and  the  smoke  rushes  over  them  all. 
Ha!  what  dim  forms  are  those  on  the  ladder?  Near  and 
nearer — crash  come  the  roof-tiles.  Alas,  and  alas! — no!  a  cry 
of  joy — a  "Thank  Heaven!"  and  the  women  force  their  way 
through  the  men,  to  come  round  the  child  and  the  mother. 
All  is  gone  save  that  skeleton  ruin.  But  the  ruin  is  seen  from 
above.    O  Art !  study  life  from  the  roof-tops ! 


CHAPTER  III. 

I  was  again  foiled  in  seeing  Trevanion.  It  was  the  Easter 
recess,  and  he  was  at  the  house  of  one  of  his  brother  ministers, 
somewhere  in  the  north  of  England.  But  Lady  Ellinor  was 
in  London,  and  I  was  ushered  into  her  presence.  Nothing 
could  be  more  cordial  than  her  manner,  though  she  wTas  evi- 
dently much  depressed  in  spirits,  and  looked  wan  and  careworn. 

After  the  kindest  inquiries  relative  to  my  parents  and  the 
Captain,  she  entered  with  much  sympathy  into  my  schemes 
and  plans,  which  she  said  Trevanion  had  confided  to  her. 
The  sterling  kindness  that  belonged,  to  my  old  patron  (despite 
his  affected  anger  at  my  not  accepting  his  proffered  loan),  had 
not  only  saved  me  and  my  fellow-adventurer  all  trouble  as  to 
allotment  orders,  but  procured  advice  as  to  choice  of  site  and 
soil,  from  the  best  practical  experience,  which  we  found  after- 
wards exceedingly  useful.  And  as  Lady  Ellinor  gave  me  the 
little  packet  of  papers,  with  Trevanion's  shrewd  notes  on  the 
margin,  she  said  with  a  half  sigh,  "Albert  bids  me  say  that  he 
wishes  he  were  as  sanguine  of  his  success  in  the  cabinet  as  of 
yours  in  the  Bush."  She  then  turned  to  her  husband's  rise 
and  prospects,  and  her  face  begun  to  change.  Her  eyes  spark- 
led, the  colour  came  to  her  cheeks — "But  you  are  one  of  the 
few  who  know  him,"  she  said,  interrupting  herself  suddenly; 
"you  know  how  he  sacrifices  all  things — joy,  leisure,  health — 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  353 

to  his  country.  There  is  not  one  selfish  thought  in  his  nature. 
And  yet  such  envy — such  obstacles  still !  and"  (her  eyes  drop- 
ped on  her  dress,  and  I  perceived  that  she  was  in  mourning, 
though  the  mourning  was  not  deep),  "and,"  she  added,  "it 
has  pleased  Heaven  to  withdraw  from  his  side  one  who  would 
have  been  worthy  his  alliance." 

I  felt  for  the  proud  woman,  though  her  emotion  seemed  more 
that  of  pride  than  of  sorrow.  And  perhaps  Lord  Castleton's 
highest  merit  in  her  eyes  had  been  that  of  ministering  to  her 
husband's  power  and  her  own  ambition.  I  bowed  my  head  in 
silence,  and  thought  of  Fanny.  Did  she,  too,  pine  for  the  lost 
rank,  or  rather  mourn  the  lost  lover? 

After  a  time,  I  said  hesitatingly,  "I  scarcely  presume  to 
condole  with  you,  Lady  Ellinor !  yet  believe  me,  few  things 
ever  shocked  me  like  the  death  you  allude  to.  I  trust  Miss 
Trevanion' s  health  has  not  much  suffered.  Shall  I  not  see  her 
before  I  leave  England  ?" 

Lady  Ellinor  fixed  her  keen  bright  eyes  searchingly  on  my 
countenance,  and  perhaps  the  gaze  satisfied  her,  for  she  held 
out  her  hand  to  me  with  a  frankness  almost  tender,  and  said 
— "  Had  I  had  a  son,  the  dearest  wish  of  my  heart  had  been 
to  see  you  wedded  to  my  daughter." 

I  started  up — the  blood  rushed  to  my  cheeks,  and  then  left 
me  pale  as  death.  I  looked  reproachfully  at  Lady  Ellinor,  and 
the  word  "  cruel !"  faltered  on  my  lips. 

"  Yes,"  continued  Lady  Ellinor,  mournfully,  "  that  was  my 
real  thought,  my  impulse  of  regret,  when  I  first  saw  you. 
But,  as  it  is,  do  not  think  me  too  hard  and  Avorldly  if  I  quote 
the  lofty  old  French  proverb,  Noblesse  oblige.  Listen  to  me, 
my  young  friend — we  may  never  meet  again,  and  I  would  not 
have  your  father's  son  think  unkindly  of  me,  with  all  my  faults. 
From  my  first  childhood  I  was  ambitious — not  as  women 
usually  are,  of  mere  wealth  and  rank — but  ambitious  as  noble 
men  are,  of  power  and  fame.  A  woman  can  only  indulge 
such  ambition  by  investing  it  in  another.  It  was  not  wealth, 
it  was  not  rank,  that  attracted  me  to  Albert  Trevanion :  it 
was  the  nature  that  dispenses  with  the  wealth,  and  commands 
the  rank.  Nay,"  continued  Lady  Ellinor,  in  a  voice  that  slight- 
ly trembled,  "I  may  have  seen  in  my  youth,  before  I  knew 
Trevanion,  one  (she  paused  a  moment,  and  went  on  hurriedly) 
— one  who  wanted  but  ambition  to  have  realized  my  ideal. 


35  I  i  in:  i  w tons: 

Perhaps,  eveD  when  I  married — and  it  was  said  for  love — T 
Loved  less  with  my  whole  heart  than  with  my  whole  mind.  I 
may  Bay  this  now,  for  now  every  Wat  of  this  pulse  is  wholly 
and  only  true  to  him  with  whom  I  have  schemed,  and  toiled, 
and  aspired  ;  with  whom  I  have  grown  as  one;  with  whom  I 
have  shared  the  struggle,  and  now  partake  the  triumph,  real- 
being  the  visions  of  my  youth." 

Again  the  light  broke  from  the  dark  eyes  of  this  grand 
daughter  of  the  world,  who  was  so  superb  a  type  of  that 
moral  contradiction — an  ambitious  woman. 

"  I  cannot  tell  you,"  resumed  Lady  Ellinor,  softening,  "  how 
pleased  I  was  when  you  came  to  live  with  us.  Your  father 
has  perhaps  spoken  to  you  of  me,  and  of  our  first  acquaint- 
ance !" 

Lady  Ellinor  paused  abruptly,  and  surveyed  me  as  she 
paused.     I  was  silent. 

"  Perhaps,  too,  he  has  blamed  me  ?"  she  resumed,  with  a 
heightened  colour. 

"  He  never  blamed  you,  Lady  Ellinor !" 

"  He  had  a  right  to  do  so — though  I  doubt  if  he  would  have 
blamed  me  on  the  true  ground.  Yet  no ;  he  never  could  have 
done  me  the  wrong  that  your  uncle  did,  when,  long  years  ago, 
.Mr.  De  Caxton  in  a  letter — the  very  bitterness  of  which  dis- 
armed all  anger — accused  me  of  having  trifled  with  Austin — 
nay,  with  himself!  And  he,  at  least,  had  no  right  to  reproach 
me,"  continued  Lady  Ellinor  warmly,  and  with  a  curve  of  her 
haughty  lip ;  "  for  if  I  felt  interest  in  his  wild  thirst  for  some 
romantic  glory,  it  was  but  in  the  hope  that  what  made  the  one 
brother  so  restless,  might  at  least  wake  the  other  to  the  ambi- 
tion that  would  have  become  his  intellect  and  aroused  his  en- 
ergies.  But  these  are  old  tales  of  follies  and  delusions  now  no 
more :  only  this  will  I  say,  that  I  have  ever  felt,  in  thinking  of 
your  father,  and  even  of  your  sterner  uncle,  as  if  my  conscience 
reminded  me  of  a  debt  which  I  longed  to  discharge — if  not  to 
them,  to  their  children.  So,  when  we  knew  you,  believe  me, 
thai  your  interests,  your  career,  instantly  became  to  me  an  ob- 
ject.  But  mistaking  you — when  I  saw  your  ardent  industry 
benl  on  serious  objects,  and  accompanied  by  a  mind  so  fresh 
and  buoyant;  and,  absorbed  as  I  was  in  schemes  or  projects 
far  beyond  a  woman's  ordinary  province  of  hearth  and  home 
— I  never  dreamed,  while  you  were  our  guest — never  dreamed 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  355 

of  danger  to  you  or  Fanny.  I  wound  you — pardon  me ;  but 
I  must  vindicate  myself.  I  repeat  that,  if  we  had  a  son  to  in- 
herit our  name,  to  bear  the  burthen  which  the  world  lays  upon 
those  who  are  born  to  influence  the  world's  destinies,  there  is 
no  one  to  whom  Trevanion  and  myself  would  sooner  have  in- 
trusted the  happiness  of  a  daughter.  But  my  daughter  is  the 
sole  representative  of  the  mother's  line,  of  the  father's  name : 
it  is  not  her  happiness  alone  that  I  have  to  consult,  it  is  her 
duty — duty  to  her  birthright,  to  the  career  of  the  noblest  of 
England's  patriots — duty,  I  may  say,  without  exaggeration,  to 
the  country  for  the  sake  of  Avhich  that  career  is  run !" 

"  Say  no  more,  Lady  Elliuor ;  say  no  more.  I  understand 
you.  I  have  no  hope — I  never  had  hope — it  was  a  madness — 
it  is  over.  It  is  but  as  a  friend  that  I  ask  again  if  I  may  see 
Miss  Trevanion  in  your  presence,  before — before  I  go  alone 
into  this  long  exile,  to  leave,  perhaps,  my  dust  in  a  stranger's 
soil !  Ay,  look  in  my  face — you  cannot  fear  my  resolution,  my 
honour,  my  truth.  But  once,  Lady  Ellinor — but  once  more. 
Do  I  ask  in  vain  ?" 

Lady  Ellinor  was  evidently  much  moved.  I  bent  down  al- 
most in  the  attitude  of  kneeling ;  and,  brushing  away  her  tears 
with  one  hand,  she  laid  the  ether  on  my  head  tenderly,  and 
said  in  a  very  low  voice — 

"  I  entreat  you  not  to  ask  me ;  I  entreat  you  not  to  see  my 
daughter.  You  have  shown  that  you  are  not  selfish— conquer 
yourself  still.  What  if  such  an  interview,  however  guarded 
you  might  be,  were  but  to  agitate,  unnerve  my  child,  unsettle 
her  peace,  prey  upon — " 

"  Oh,  do  not  speak  thus — she  did  not  share  my  feelings !" 

" Could  her  mother  own  it  if  she  did?  Come,  come,  re- 
member how  young  you  both  are.  When  you  return,  all  these 
dreams  will  be  forgotten  ;  then  we  can  meet  as  before — then  I 
will  be  your  second  mother,  and  again  your  career  shall  be  my 
care ;  for  I  do  not  think  that  we  shall  leave  j'ou  so  long  in  this 
exile  as  you  seem  to  forebode.  No,  no ;  it  is  but  an  absence 
— an  excursion — not  a  search  after  fortune.  Your  fortune — 
leave  that  to  us  when  you  return !" 

"  And  I  am  to  see  her  no  more !"  I  murmured,  as  I  rose, 
and  went  silently  towards  the  window  to  conceal  my  face.  The 
great  si  niggles  in  life  are  limited  moments.  In  the  drooping 
of  the  head  upon  the  bosom — in  the  pressure  of  the  hand  upon 


in  1:  CAXTONS : 

tlie  brow — we  maj  Bcarcely  consume  a  second  in  our  three- 
score years  and  ten;  but  what  revolutions  of  our  whole  being 
may  pass  within  us,  while  that  single  sand  drops  noiseless 
down  to  the  bottom  of  the  hour-glass. 

I  came  back  with  firm  step  to  Lady  Ellinor,  and  said  calm- 
ly, "  My  reason  tells  me  that  you  are  right,  and  I  submit.  For- 
give me!  and  do  not  think  me  ungrateful  and  over-proud  if  I 
add,  that  you  must  leave  me  still  the  object  in  life  that  con- 
soles and  encourages  me  through  all." 

"  What  object  is  that  ?"  asked  Lady  Ellinor,  hesitatingly. 

"Independence  for  myself,  and  ease  to  those  for  whom  life 
is  still  sweet.  This  is  my  twofold  object;  and  the  means  to 
effect  it  must  be  my  own  heart  and  my  own  hands.  And  now, 
convey  all  my  thanks  to  your  noble  husband,  and  accept  my 
warm  prayers  for  yourself  and  her — whom  I  will  not  name. 
Farewell,  Lady  Ellinor."  # 

"  Xo,  do  not  leave  me  so  hastily ;  I  have  many  things  to 
discuss  with  you — at  least  to  ask  of  you.  Tell  me  how  your 
father  bears  his  reverse  ? — tell  me,  at  least,  if  there  be  aught 
he  will  suffer  us  to  do  for  him  ?  There  are  many  appointments 
in  Trevanion's  range  of  influence  that  would  suit  even  the  wil- 
ful indolence  of  a  man  of  letters.     Come,  be  frank  with  me !" 

I  could  not  resist  so  much  kindness ;  so  I  sat  down,  and,  as 
collectedly  as  I  could,  replied  to  Lady  Ellinor's  questions,  and 
sought  to  convince  her  that  my  father  only  felt  his  losses  so 
far  as  they  affected  me,  and  that  nothing  in  Trevanion's  pow- 
er Avas  likely  to  tempt  him  from  his  retreat,  or  calculated  to 
compensate  for  a  change  in  his  habits.  Turning  at  last  from 
my  parents,  Lady  Ellinor  inquired  for  Roland,  and,  on  learning 
that  he  was  with  me  in  town,  expressed  a  strong  desire  to  see 
him.  I  told  her  I  would  communicate  her  wish,  and  she  then 
said  thoughtfully — 

"He  has  a  son,  T  think,  and  I  have  heard  that  there  is  some 
unhappy  dissension  between  them." 

"  Who  could  have  told  you  thai  ?"  I  asked,  in  surprise,  know- 
ing how  closely  Roland  had  kept  the  secret  of  his  family  afflic- 
tions. 

"Oh,I  heard  so  from  some  one  who  knew  Captain  "Roland; 
I  forgel  when  and  where  I  heard  it — but  is  it  not  the  fact?" 

"My  uncle  Roland  has  no  son." 

"How!" 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  35  7 

"  His  son  is  dead." 

"  How  such  a  loss  must  grieve  him !" 

I  did  not  speak. 

"  But  is  he  sure  that  his  son  is  dead  ?  What  joy  if*  he  were 
mistaken — if  the  sou  yet  lived!" 

"  Xay,  my  uncle  has  a  brave  heart,  and  he  is  resigned ; — 
but,  pardon  me,  have  you  heard  anything  of  that  son  ?" 

"  I ! — what  should  I  hear  ?  I  would  fain  learn,  however, 
from  your  uncle  himself,  what  he  might  like  to  tell  me  of  his 
sorrows — or  if,  indeed,  there  be  any  chance  that — " 

"That— what?" 

"  That — that  his  son  still  survives." 

"  I  think  not,"  said  I ;  "  and  I  doubt  whether  you  will  learn 
much  from  my  uncle.  Still  there  is  something  in  your  words 
that  belies  their  apparent  meaning,  and  makes  me  suspect  that 
you  know  more  than  you  will  say." 

"  Diplomatist !"  said  Lady  Ellinor,  half  smiling ;  but  then, 
her  face  settling  into  a  seriousness  almost  severe,  she  added — 
"  It  is  terrible  to  think  that  a  father  should  hate  his  son  !" 

"  Hate ! — Roland  hate  his  son  !     What  calumny  is  this  ?" 

"  He  does  not  do  so,  then  !  Assure  me  of  that ;  I  shall  be 
so  glad  to  know  that  I  have  been  misinformed." 

"  I  can  tell  you  this,  and  no  more — for  no  more  do  I  know — 
that  if  ever  the  soul  of  a  father  were  wrapt  up  in  a  son — fear, 
hope,  gladness,  sorrow,  all  reflected  back  on  a  father's  heart 
from  the  shadows  on  a  son's  life — Roland  was  that  father 
while  the  son  lived  still." 

"I  cannot  disbelieve  you!"  exclaimed  Lady  Ellinor,  though 
in  a  tone  of  surprise.     "  Well,  do  let  me  see  your  uncle." 

"  I  will  do  my  best  to  induce  him  to  visit  you,  and  learn  all 
that  you  evidently  conceal  from  me." 

Lady  Ellinor  evasively  replied  to  this  insinuation,  and  short- 
ly afterwards  I  left  that  house  in  which  I  had  known  the  hap- 
piness that  brings  the  folly,  and  the  grief  that  bequeaths  the 
wisdom. 


CHAPTER  IY. 

I  had  always  felt  a  warm  and  almost  filial  affection  for  Lady 
Ellinor,  independently  of  her  relationship  to  Fanny,  and  of  the 
gratitude  with  which  her  kindness  inspired  me  :  for  there  is  an 


358  tin;  «  ax  ions  : 

affection  very  peculiar  in  its  nature,  and  very  high  in  its  degree, 
which  results  from  the  blending  of  two  sentiments  not  often 
allied — viz.  pity  and  admiration.  It  was  impossible  not  to  ad- 
mire the  rare  gifts  and  great  qualities  of  Lady  Ellinor,  and  not 

to  feel  pity  for  the  cares,  anxieties,  and  sorrows  which  torment- 
ed one  who,  with  all  the  sensitiveness  of  woman,  went  forth 
into  the  rough  world  of  man. 

My  father's  confession  had  somewhat  impaired  my  esteem 
for  Lady  Ellinor,  and  had  left  on  my  mind  the  uneasy  impres- 
sion that  she  had  trifled  with  his  deep  and  Roland's  impetuous 
heart.  The  conversation  that  had  just  passed  allowed  me  to 
judge  her  with  more  justice — allowed  me  to  see  that  she  had 
really  shared  the  affection  she  had  inspired  in  the  student, 
but  that  ambition  had  been  stronger  than  love — an  ambition, 
it  might  be,  irregular,  and  not  strictly  feminine,  but  still  of  no 
vulgar  nor  sordid  kind.  I  gathered,  too,  from  her  hints  and 
allusions,  her  true  excuse  for  Roland's  misconception  of  her 
apparent  interest  in  himself:  she  had  but  seen,  in  the  wild  en- 
ergies of  the  elder  brother,  some  agency  by  which  to  arouse 
the  serener  faculties  of  the  younger.  She  had  but  sought,  in 
the  strange  comet  that  flashed  before  her,  to  fix  a  lever  that 
might  move  the  star.  Nor  could  I  withhold  my  reverence 
from  the  woman  who,  not  being  married  precisely  for  love,  had 
no  sooner  linked  her  nature  to  one  worthy  of  it,  than  her 
whole  life  became  as  fondly  devoted  to  her  husband's  as  if  he 
had  been  the  object  of  her  first  romance  and  her  earliest  affec- 
tions. If  even  her  child  was  so  secondary  to  her  husband — if 
the  fate  of  that  child  was  but  regarded  by  her  as  one  to  be 
rendered  subservient  to  the  grand  destinies  of  Trevanion — still 
it  was  impossible  to  recognize  the  error  of  that  conjugal  devo- 
tion without  admiring  the  wife,  though  one  might  condemn 
the  mother.  Turning  from  these  meditations,  I  felt  a  lover's 
thrill  of  selfish  joy,  amidst  all  the  mournful  sorrow  comprised 
in  the  thought  that  I  should  see  Fanny  no  more.  Was  it  true, 
as  Lady  Ellinor  implied,  though  delicately,  that  Fanny  still 
cherished  a  remembrance  of  me — which  a  brief  interview,  a 
last  farewell,  might  reawaken  too  dangerously  for  her  peace? 
Well,  that   was  a  1  bought  that  it  became  me  not  to  indulge. 

What  could  Lady  Ellinor  have  heard  of  Roland  and  his  son  ? 
Was  it  possible  that  the  lost  lived  still?  Asking  myself  these 
questions,  I  arrived  at  our  lodgings,  and  saw  the  Captain  him- 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  359 

self  before  me,  busied  with  the  inspection  of  sundry  specimens 
of  the  rude  necessities  an  Australian  adventurer  requires. 
There  stood  the  old  soldier  by  the  window,  examining  narrow- 
ly into  the  temper  of  hand-saw  and  tenon-saw,  broad-axe  and 
drawing-knife  ;  and  as  I  came  up  to  him,  he  looked  at  me  from 
under  his  black  brows  with  gruff  compassion,  and  said  peev- 
ishly— 

"  Fine  weapons  these  for  the  son  of  a  gentleman ! — one  bit 
of  steel  in  the  shape  of  a  sword  were  worth  them  all." 

"  Any  weapon  that  conquers  fate  is  noble  in  the  hands  of  a 
brave  man,  uncle." 

"  The  boy  has  an  answer  for  everything,"  quoth  the  Captain, 
smiling,  as  he  took  out  his  purse  and  paid  the  shopman. 

When  we  were  alone,  I  said  to  him — "  Uncle,  you  must  go 
and  see  Lady  Ellinor ;  she  desires  me  to  tell  you  so." 

"Pshaw!" 

"You  will  not?" 

"  Xo !" 

"  Uncle,  I  think  that  she  has  something  to  say  to  you  with 
regard  to — to — pardon  me ! — to  my  cousin." 

"  To  Blanche  ?" 

"  Xo,  no — the  cousin  I  never  saw."  Roland  turned  pale,  and 
sinking  down  on  a  chair,  faltered  out — "  To  him — to  my  son  ?" 

"  Yes ;  but  I  do  not  think  it  is  news  that  will  afflict  you. 
Uncle,  are  you  sure  that  my  cousin  is  dead  ?" 

"  What ! — how  dare  you  ! — who  doubts  it  ?  Dead — dead 
to  me  for  ever !  Boy,  would  you  have  him  live  to  dishonour 
these  gray  hairs  ?" 

"  Sir,  sir,  forgive  me — uncle,  forgive  me  :  but,  pray,  go  to  see 
Lady  Ellinor ;  for  whatever  she  has  to  say,  I  repeat  that  I  am 
sure  it  will  be  nothing  to  wound  you." 

"Xothing  to  wound  me — yet  relate  to  him!" 

It  is  impossible  to  convey  to  the  reader  the  despair  that  was 
in  those  words. 

"  Perhaps,"  said  I,  after  a  long  pause,  and  in  a  low  voice — 
for  I  was  awe-stricken — "perhaps — if  he  be  dead — he  may 
have  repented  of  all  offence  to  you  before  he  died." 

" Repented — ha,  ha!" 

"  Or,  if  he  be  not  dead — " 

"  Hush,  boy— hush !" 

"  While  there  is  life,  there  is  hope  of  repentance." 


300  the  CAXTON8  : 

"  Look  you,  nephew,"  said  the  Captain,  rising,  and  folding 
his  anus  resolutely  on  his  breast — "look  you, I  desired  that 
t lint  name  might  never  l>e  breathed.  I  have  not  cursed  my 
son  yet  ;  could  he  come  to  lift — the  curse  might  fall!  You  do 
not  know  what  torture  your  words  have  given  me,  just  when 
I  had  opened  my  heart  to  another  son,  and  found  that  son  in 
you.  With  respect  to  the  lost,  I  have  now  but  one  prayer,  and 
you  know  it — the  heartbroken  prayer — that  his  name  may 
never  more  come  to  my  ears!" 

As  he  closed  these  words,  to  which  I  ventured  no  reply,  the 
Captain  took  long,  disordered  strides  across  the  room:  and 
suddenly,  as  if  the  space  imprisoned,  or  the  air  stifled  him,  he 
seized  his  hat  and  hastened  into  the  streets.  Recovering  my 
surprise  and  dismay,  I  ran  after  him ;  but  he  commanded  me 
to  leave  him  to  his  own  thoughts,  in  a  voice  so  stern,  yet  so 
sad,  that  I  had  no  choice  but  to  obey.  I  knew,  by  my  own 
experience,  how  necessary  is  solitude  in  the  moments  when 
grief  is  strongest  and  thought  most  troubled. 


CHAPTER  V. 

Hours  elapsed,  and  the  Captain  had  not  returned  home.  I 
began  to  feel  uneasy,  and  went  forth  in  search  of  him,  though 
I  knew  not  whither  to  direct  my  steps.  I  thought  it,  however, 
at  least  probable  that  he  had  not  been  able  to  resist  visiting 
Lady  Kllinor,  so  I  went  first  to  St.  James's  Square.  My  sus- 
picions were  correct ;  the  Captain  had  been  there  two  hours 
before.  Lady  Ellinor  herself  had  gone  out  shortly  after  the 
Captain  left.  While  the  porter  was  giving  me  this  informa- 
tion, a  carriage  stopped  at  the  door,  and  a  footman,  stepping 
up,  gave  the  porter  a  note  and  a  small  parcel,  seemingly  of 
books,  saying  simply,  "  From  the  Marquess  of  Castleton."  At 
the  sound  of  that  name  I  turned  hastily,  and  recognized  Sir 
Sedley  Beaudesert  seated  in  the  carriage,  and  looking  out  of 
the  window  witli  a  dejected,  moody  expression  of  countenance, 
very  different  from  his  ordinary  aspect,  except  when  the  rare 
Bight  of  :i  gray  hair  or  a  t  winge  of  the  toothache  reminded  him 
that  he  was  no  longer  twenty-five.  Indeed,  the  change  was  so 
great  that  I  exclaimed,  dubiously — "Is  that  Sir  Sedley  Beau- 
desert?"     The  footman  looked  at  me,  and,  touching  his  hat, 


A    FAMILY   PICTURE.  361 

said,  with  a  condescending  smile, — "  Yes,  sir — now  the  Mar- 
quess of  Castleton." 

Then,  for  the  first  time  since  the  young  lord's  death,  I  re- 
membered Sir  Sedley's  expressions  of  gratitude  to  Lady  Cas- 
tleton, and  the  waters  of  Ems,  for  having  saved  him  from  "  that 
horrible  marquisate."  Meanwhile,  my  old  friend  had  perceived 
me,  exclaiming, — 

"  What !  Mr.  Gaxton !  I  am  delighted  to  see  you.  Open  the 
door,  Thomas.     Pray  come  in,  come  in." 

I  obeyed;  and  the  new  Lord  Castleton  made  room  for  me 
by  his  side. 

"  Are  you  in  a  hurry  ?"  said  he ;  "if  so,  shall  I  take  you  any- 
where ? — if  not,  give  me  half  an  hour  of  your  time,  while  I  drive 
to  the  City." 

As  I  knew  not  now  in  what  direction,  more  than  another,  to 
prosecute  my  search  for  the  Captain,  and  as  I  thought  I  might 
as  well  call  at  our  lodgings  to  inquire  if  he  had  not  returned, 
I  answered  that  I  should  be  very  happy  to  accompany  his 
lordship ;  "  though  the  City,"  said  I,  smiling,  "  sounds  to  me 
strange  upon  the  lips  of  Sir  Sedley — I  beg  pardon,  I  should 
say  of  Lord — " 

"  Don't  say  any  such  thing ;  let  me  once  more  hear  the  grate- 
ful sound  of  Sedley  Beaudesert.  Shut  the  door,  Thomas  ;  to 
Gracechurch  Street — Messrs.  Fudge  and  Fidget." 

The  carriage  drove  on. 

"  A  sad  affliction  has  befallen  me,"  said  the  Marquess,  "  and 
none  sympathize  with  me  !" 

"  Yet  all,  even  unacquainted  with  the  late  lord,  must  have 
felt  shocked  at  the  death  of  one  so  young,  and  so  full  of  prom- 
ise." 

"  So  fitted  in  every  way  to  bear  the  burden  of  the  great  Cas- 
tleton name  and  property — and  yet  you  see  it  killed  him ! — 
Ah  !  if  he  had  been  but  a  simple  gentleman,  or  if  he  had  had  a 
less  conscientious  desire  to  do  his  duties,  he  would  have  lived 
to  a  good  old  age.  I  know  what  it  is  already.  Oh,  if  you  saw 
the  piles  of  letters  on  my  table  !  I  positively  dread  the  post. 
Such  colossal  improvement  on  the  property  which  the  poor 
boy  had  begun,  for  me  to  finish.  What  do  you  think  takes 
me  to  Fudge  and  Fidget's  ?  Sir,  they  are  the  agents  for  an 
infernal  coal-mine  which  my  cousin  had  reopened  in  Durham, 
to  plague  in v  life  out  with  another  thirty  thousand  pounds 

Q 


.;»._'  the  caxtons: 

a-yearl  How  am  T  to  spend  the  money? — how  am  I  to  spend 
it  P  There's  a  cold-blooded  head  steward, who  says  that  char- 
ity is  the  greatest  crime  a  man  in  high  station  can  commit;  it 
demoralizes  the  poor.  Then,  because  some  half-a-dozen  farm- 
ers sent  me  a  round-robin,  to  the  effect  that  their  rents  were 
too  high,  and  I  wrote  them  word  that  the  rents  should  be  low- 
ered, there  was  such  a  hullabaloo  —  yon  would  have  thought 
heaven  and  earth  were  coming  together.  'If  a  man  in  the  po- 
sition of  the  Marquess  of  Castleton  set  the  example  of  letting 
land  below  its  value,  howr  could  the  poorer  squires  in  the  coun- 
try exist? — or  if  they  did  exist,  what  injustice  to  expose  them 
to  the  charge  that  they  were  grasping  landlords,  vampires,  and 
bloodsuckers  !  Clearly,  if  Lord  Castleton  lowered  his  rents 
(they  were  too  low  already),  he  struck  a  mortal  blow  at  the 
property  of  his  neighbours  if  they  followed  his  example ;  or  at 
their  characters  if  they  did  not.'  No  man  can  tell  how  hard 
it  is  to  do  good,  unless  fortune  gives  him  a  hundred  thousand 
a-year,  and  says, — c  Now,  do  good  with  it !'  Sedley  Beaudesert 
might  follow  his  whims,  and  all  that  would  be  said  against  him 
was,  '  Good-natured,  simple  fellow  !'  But  if  Lord  Castleton 
follows  his  whims,  you  would  think  he  was  a  second  Catiline 
— unsettling  the  peace,  and  undermining  the  prosperity,  of  the 
entire  nation !"  Here  the  wretched  man  paused,  and  sighed 
heavily ;  then,  as  his  thoughts  wandered  into  a  new  channel 
of*  woe,  he  resumed, — "Ah  !  if  you  could  but  see  the  forlorn 
great  house  I  am  expected  to  inhabit,  cooped  up  between  dead 
walls,  instead  of  my  pretty  rooms,  with  the  windows  full  on 
the  park ;  and  the  balls  I  am  expected  to  give,  and  the  parlia- 
mentary interest  I  am  to  keep  up;  and  the  villanous  proposal 
made  to  me  to  become  a  lord-steward  or  lord-chamberlain,  be- 
cause  it  suits  my  rank  to  be  a  sort  of  a  servant.  Oh,  Pisistra- 
tus  !  you  lucky  dog — not  twenty-one,  and  with,  I  dare  say,  not 
two  hundred  pounds  a-year  in  the  world  !" 

Thus  bemoaning  and  bewailing  his  sad  fortunes,  the  poor 
Marquess  ran  on,  till  at  last  he  exclaimed,  in  a  tone  of  yet  deej> 
er  despair, — 

••  And  everybody  says  I  must  marry,  too! — that  the  Castle- 
ton line  must  not  be  extinct  !  The  Beaudeserts  arc  a  good  old 
family  eno' — as  old,  for  what  I  know,  as  the  Castletons ;  but 
the  British  empire  would  suffer  no  loss  if  they  sank  into  the 
tomb  of*  the  CapuletS.     But  that  the  Castleton  peerage  should 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  363 

expire,  is  a  thought  of  crime  and  woe,  at  which  all  the  moth- 
ers of  England  rise  in  a  phalanx  !  And  so,  instead  of  visiting 
the  sins  of  the  fathers  on  the  sons,  it  is  the  father  that  is  to 
be  sacrificed  for  the  benefit  of  the  third  and  fourth  genera- 
tion !" 

Despite  my  causes  for  seriousness,  I  could  not  help  laughing : 
my  companion  turned  on  me  a  look  of  reproach. 

"  At  least,"  said  I,  composing  my  countenance,  "  Lord  Cas- 
tleton  has  one  comfort  in  his  afflictions— if  he  must  marry,  he 
may  choose  as  he  pleases." 

"  That  is  precisely  what  Sedley  Beaudesert  could,  and  Lord 
Castleton  cannot  do,"  said  the  Marquess,  gravely.  "The  rank 
of  Sir  Sedley  Beaudesert  was  a  quiet  and  comfortable  rank — 
he  might  marry  a  curate's  daughter,  or  a  duke's — and  please 
his  eye  or  grieve  his  heart  as  the  caprice  took  him.  But  Lord 
Castleton  must  marry,  not  for  a  wife,  but  for  a  marchioness, — 
marry  some  one  who  will  wear  his  rank  for  him, — take  the 
trouble  of  splendour  off  his  hands,  and  allow  him  to  retire  into 
a  corner,  and  dream  that  he  is  Sedley  Beaudesert  once  more ! 
Yes,  it  must  be  so — the  crowning  sacrifice  must  be  completed 
at  the  altar.  But  a  truce  to  my  complaints.  Trevanion  in- 
forms me  you  are  going  to  Australia — can  that  be  true  ?" 

"  Perfectly  true." 

"  They  say  there  is  a  sad  want  of  ladies  there." 

"  So  much  the  better, — I  shall  be  all  the  more  steady." 

"  Well,  there's  something  in  that.  Have  you  seen  Lady  El- 
linor?" 

"  Yes — this  morning." 

"  Poor  woman ! — a  great  blow  to  her — we  have  tried  to  con- 
sole each  other.  Fanny,  you  know,  is  staying  at  Oxton,  in 
Surrey,  with  Lady  Castleton — the  poor  lady  is  so  fond  of  her 
— and  no  one  has  comforted  her  like  Fanny." 

"  I  was  not  aware  that  Miss  Trevanion  was  out  of  town." 

"  Only  for  a  few  days,  and  then  she  and  Lady  Ellinor  join 
Trevanion  in  the  north — you  know  he  is  with  Lord  ^N" ,  set- 
tling measures  on  which — but  alas!  they  consult  me  now  on 
those  matters — force  their  secrets  on  me.  I  have,  Heaven 
knows  how  many  votes !  Poor  me !  upon  my  word,  if  Lady 
Ellinor  was  a  widow,  I  should  certainly  make  up  to  her ;  very 
clever  woman,  nothing  bores  her."  (The  Marquess  yawned — 
Sir  Sedley  Beaudesert  never  yawned.)     "  Trevanion  has  pro- 


3  04  THE   OAXTONS: 

vided  for  his  Scotch  secretary,  and  is  about  to  get  a  place  in 
the  Foreign  Office  for  that  young  fellow  Go wer,  whom,  be- 
tween you  and  me,  I  don't  like.  But  he  has  bewitched  Tre- 
vanion  \n 

MWhat  sort  of  a  person  is  this  Mr.  Gower? — I  remember 
you  said  that  he  was  clever  and  good-looking." 

"  He  is  both,  but  it  is  not  the  cleverness  of  youth ;  he  is  as 
hard  and  sarcastic  as  if  he  had  been  cheated  fifty  times,  and 
jilted  a  hundred!  Neither  are  his  good  looks  that  letter  of 
recommendation  which  a  handsome  face  is  said  to  be.  He 
lias  an  expression  of  countenance  very  much  like  that  of  Lord 
Hertford's  pet  bloodhound  when  a  stranger  comes  into  the 
room.  Very  sleek,  handsome  dog,  the  bloodhound  is  certain- 
ly— well-mannered,  and,  I  dare  say,  exceedingly  tame ;  but  still 
you  have  but  to  look  at  the  corner  of  the  eye,  to  know  that  it 
is  only  the  habit  of  the  drawing-room  that  suppresses  the  crea- 
ture's constitutional  tendency  to  seize  you  by  the  throat,  in- 
stead of  giving  you  a  paw.  Still  this  Mr.  Gower  has  a  very 
striking  head — something  about  it  Moorish  or  Spanish,  like  a 
picture  by  Murillo  :  I  half  suspect  that  he  is  less  a  GowTer  than 
a  gipsy !" 

"  What !"  I  cried,  as  I  listened  wTith  rapt  and  breathless  at- 
tention to. this  description.  "  He  is  then  very  dark,  with  high 
narrow  forehead,  features  slightly  aquiline,  but  very  delicate, 
and  teeth  so  dazzling  that  the  whole  face  seems  to  sparkle 
when  he  smiles — though  it  is  only  the  lip  that  smiles,  not  the 
eye." 

"  Exactly  as  you  say ;  you  have  seen  him,  then  ?" 
"  Why,  I  am  not  sure,  since  you  say  his  name  is  Gower." 
"  lie  says  his  name  is  Gower,"  returned  Lord  Castleton, 
dryly,  as  he  inhaled  the  Beaudesert  mixture. 

"  And  where  is  he  now  ? — with  Mr.  Trevanion  ?" 
"  Yes,  I  believe  so.     Ah !  here  we  are — Fudge  and  Fidget ! 
But,  perhaps,"  added  Lord  Castleton,  with  a  gleam  of  hope  in 
his  blue  eye — "perhaps  they  are  not  at  home!" 

Alas!  that  wras  an  illusive  "imagining,"  as  the  poets  of  the 
nineteenth  century  unaffectedly  express  themselves.  Messrs. 
Fudge  and  Fidget  were  never  out  to  such  clients  as  the  Mar- 
quess of  Castleton  :  with  a  deep  sigh,  and  an  altered  expres- 
sion of  face,  the  Victim  of  Fortune  slowly  descended  the  steps 
of  the  carriage. 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  365 

"I  can't  ask  you  to  wait  for  me,"  said  he:  "Heaven  only 
knows  how  long  I  shall  be  kept !  Take  the  carriage  where  you 
will,  and  send  it  back  to  me." 

"  A  thousand  thanks,  my  dear  lord ;  I  would  rather  walk : 
but  you  will  let  me  call  on  you  before  I  leave  town  ?" 

"  Let  you ! — I  insist  on  it.  I  am  still  at  the  old  quarters — 
under  pretence,"  said  the  Marquess,  with  a  sly  twinkle  of  the 
eyelid,  "  that  Castleton  House  wants  painting !" 

"  At  twelve  to-morrow,  then  ?" 

"  Twelve  to-morrow.  Alas !  that's  just  the  hour  at  which 
Mr.  Screw,  the  agent  for  the  London  property  (two  squares, 
seven  streets,  and  a  lane !)  is  to  call." 

"  Perhaps  two  o'clock  will  suit  you  better  ?" 

"  Two !  just  the  hour  at  which  Mr.  Plausible,  one  of  the  Cas- 
tleton members,  insists  upon  telling  me  why  his  conscience  will 
not  let  him  vote  with  Trevanion !" 

"Three  o'clock?" 

"  Three ! — just  the  hour  at  which  I  am  to  see  the  secretary 
of  the  Treasury,  who  has  promised  to  relieve  Mr.  Plausible's 
conscience !  But  come  and  dine  with  me — you  will  meet  the 
executors  to  the  will !" 

"  Nay,  Sir  Sedley — that  is,  my  dear  lord — I  will  take  my 
chance,  and  look  in  after  dinner." 

"  Do  so ;  my  guests  are  not  lively !  What  a  firm  step  the 
rogue  has !  Only  twenty,  I  think — twenty !  and  not  an  acre 
of  property  to  plague  him !"  So  saying,  the  Marquess  dolor- 
ously shook  his  head,  and  vanished  through  the  noiseless  ma- 
hogany doors,  behind  which  Messrs.  Fudge  and  Fidget  await- 
ed the  unhappy  man, — with  the  accounts  of  the  great  Castle- 
ton coal-mine. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

Ox  my  way  towards  our  lodgings,  I  resolved  to  look  in  at 
a  humble  tavern,  in  the  coffee-room  of  which  the  Captain  and 
myself  habitually  dined.  It  was  now  about  the  usual  hour  in 
which  we  took  that  meal,  and  he  might  be  there  waiting  for 
me.  I  had  just  gained  the  steps  of  this  tavern,  when  a  stage- 
coach came  rattling  along  the  pavement,  and  drew  up  at  an 
inn  of  more  pretensions  than  that  which  we  favoured,  situated 


;>oG  the  caxtoxs: 

within  a  few  doors  of  the  latter.  As  the  coach  stopped,  my  eye 
Mas  caught  by  the  Trevanion  livery,  which  was  very  peculiar. 
Thinking  I  must  be  deceived,  I  drew  nearer  to  the  wearer  of 
the  livery,  who  had  just  descended  from  the  roof,  and  while 
he  paid  i  he  coachman,  gave  his  orders  to  a  waiter  who  emerged 
from  the  inn — "Half-and-half,  cold  without!"  The  tone  of 
the  voice  struck  me  as  familiar,  and  the  man  now  looking  up, 
I  beheld  the  features  of  Mr.  Peacock.  Yes,  unquestionably  it 
was  he  The  whiskers  were  shaved — there  were  traces  of 
powder  in  the  hair  of  the  wig — the  livery  of  the  Trevanions 
(ay,  the  very  livery — crest-button  and  all)  upon  that  portly 
figure,  which  I  had  last  seen  in  the  more  august  robes  of  a 
beadle.  But  Mr.  Peacock  it  was — Peacock  travestied,  but 
Peacock  still.  Before  I  had  recovered  my  amaze,  a  woman 
got  out  of  a  cabriolet,  that  seemed  to  have  been  in  waiting  for 
the  arrival  of  the  coach,  and,  hurrying  up  to  Mr.  Peacock,  said 
in  the  loud  impatient  tone  common  to  the  fairest  of  the  fair 
sex,  when  in  haste — "How  late  you  are! — I  was  just  going. 
I  must  get  back  to  Oxton  to-niffht." 

Oxton — Miss  Trevanion  was  staying  at  Oxton !  I  was  now 
close  behind  the  pair — I  listened  with  my  heart  in  my  ear. 

"  So  you  shall,  my  dear — so  you  shall ;  just  come  in,  will 
you  ?" 

"No,  no;  I  have  only  ten  minutes  to  catch  the  coach. 
I  lave  you  any  letter  for  me  from  Mr.  Gowcr  ?  How  can  I  be 
sure,  if  I  don't  see  it  under  his  own  hand,  that — " 

"  Hush  !"  said  Peacock,  sinking  his  voice  so  low  that  I  could 
only  catch  the  words,  "  no  names — letter,  pooh,  I'll  tell  you." 
He  then  drew  her  apart,  and  wmispered  to  her  for  some  mo- 
ments. I  watched  the  woman's  face,  which  was  bent  towards 
her  companion's,  and  it  seemed  to  show  quick  intelligence. 
She  nodded  her  head  more  than  once,  as  if  in  impatient  assent 
to  what  was  said;  and,  after  a  shaking  of  hands,  hurried  off 
to  the  cab ;  then,  as  if  a  thought  had  struck  her,  she  ran  back, 
and  said — 

"But  in  case  my  lady  should  not  go — if  there's  any  change 
of  plan?" 

"There'll  be  no  change,  you  may  be  sure — positively  to- 
morrow— not  too  early;  you  understand?" 

"Yes,  yes;  ^ood-by" — and  the  woman,  who  was  dressed 

with  :i  quiet  neatness  that  seemed  to  stamp  her  profession  as 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  367 

that  of  an  abigail  (black  cloak  with  long  cape — of  that  peculiar 
silk  which  seems  spun  on  purpose  for  ladies'-maids — bonnet  to 
match,  with  red  and  black  ribbons),  hastened  once  more  away, 
and  in  another  moment  the  cab  drove  off  furiously. 

What  could  all  this  mean  ?  By  this  time  the  waiter  brought 
Mr.  Peacock  the  half-and-half.  He  despatched  it  hastily,  and 
then  strode  on  towards  a  neighbouring  stand  of  cabriolets.  I 
followed  him;  and  just  as,  after  beckoning  one  of  the  vehicles 
from  the  stand,  he  had  ensconced  himself  therein,  I  sprang  up 
the  steps  and  placed  myself  by  his  side.  "  Now,  Mr.  Peacock," 
said  I,  "  you  will  tell  me  at  once  how  you  come  to  wear  that 
livery,  or  I  shall  order  the  cabman  to  drive  to  Lady  Ellinor 
Trevanion's,  and  ask  her  that  question  myself." 

"  And  who  the  devil ! — Ah,  you're  the  young  gentleman  that 
came  to  me  behind  the  scenes — I  remember." 

"  Where  to,  sir  ?"  asked  the  cabman. 

"  To — to  London  Bridge,"  said  Mr.  Peacock. 

The  man  mounted  the  box,  and  drove  on. 

"  Well,  Mr.  Peacock,  I  Avait  your  answer.  I  guess  by  your 
face  that  you  are  about  to  tell  me  a  lie  ;  I  advise  you  to  speak 
the  truth." 

"I  don't  know  what  business  you  have  to  question  me," 
said  Mr.  Peacock,  sullenly ;  and,  raising  his  glance  from  his 
own  clenched  fists,  he  suffered  it  to  wander  over  my  form  with 
so  vindictive  a  significance  that  I  interrupted  the  survey  by 
saying,  " '  Will  you  encounter  the  house  ?'  as  the  Swan  inter- 
rogatively puts  it — shall  I  order  the  cabman  to  drive  to  St. 
James's  Square?" 

"  Oh,  you  know  my  weak  point,  sir ;  any  man  who  can 
quote  Will — sweet  Will — has  me  on  the  hip,"  rejoined  Mr. 
Peacock,  smoothing  his  countenance,  and  spreading  his  palms 
on  his  knees.  "  But  if  a  man  does  fall  in  the  world,  and,  after 
keeping  servants  of  his  own,  is  obliged  to  be  himself  a  servant, 

'I  will  not  shame 

To  tell  you  what  I  am.'  " 

"  The  Swan  says,  '  To  tell  you  what  I  teas,''  Mr.  Peacock. 
But  enough  of  this  trifling ;  who  placed  you  with  Mr.  Tre- 
vanion  ?" 

Mr.  Peacock  looked  down  for  a  moment,  and  then,  fixing  his 
eyes  on  me,  said — ';  Well,  I'll  tell  you :  you  asked  me,  when 
we  met  last,  about  a  young  gentleman — Mr. — Mr.  Vivian." 


HG8  the  caxtons : 

PisisTKATrs. — "Proceed." 

I'ka.  oh  k. — v*  I  know  you  don't  want  to  harm  him.  Besides, 
•  Be  hath  a  prosperous  art,'  and  one  day  or  other — mark  my 
words,  or  rather  my  friend  Will's — 

'  He  will  bestride  this  narrow  world 
Like  a  Colossus.' 

Upon  my  life  he  will — like  a  Colossus, 
'  And  we  petty  men — '  " 

Pisistratus  (savagely). — "Go  on  with  your  story." 
Peacock  (snappishly). — "  I  am  going  on  with  it !  You  put 
me  out ;  where  was  I — oh — ah — yes.  I  had  just  been  sold  up 
— not  a  penny  in  my  pocket ;  and  if  you  could  have  seen  my 
coat — yet  that  was  better  than  the  small-clothes !  Well,  it  was 
in  Oxford  Street — no,  it  was  in  the  Strand,  near  the  Lowther — 

'  The  sun  was  in  the  heavens,  and  the  proud  day 
Attended  with  the  pleasures  of  the  world.' " 

Pisistratus  (lowering  the  glass). — "To  St.  James's  Square?" 
Peacock. — "  No,  no ;  to  London  Bridge. 

1  How  use  doth  breed  a  habit  in  a  man !' 

I  will  go  on — honour  bright.     So  I  met  Mr.  Vivian,  and  as  he 
had  known  me  in  better  days,  and  has  a  good  heart  of  his  own, 

he  says — 

'Horatio, — or  I  do  forget  myself.'  " 

Pisistratus  puts  his  hand  on  the  check-string. 

Peacock  (correcting  himself). — "I  mean — Why,  Johnson, 
my  good  fellow." 

Pisistratus. — "Johnson! — oh,  that's  your  name — not  Pea- 
cock." 

Peacock.  —  "Johnson  and  Peacock  both"  (with  dignity). 
u  When  you  know  the  world  as  I  do,  sir,  you  will  find  that  it 
is  ill  travelling  tins  'naughty  world'  without  a  change  of  names 
in  your  portmanteau.  'Johnson,'  says  he,  'my  good  fellow,' 
and  he  pulled  out  his  purse.  'Sir,'  said  I,  'if,  "exempt  from 
public  haunt,"  I  could  gel  something  to  do  when  this  dross  is 
gone,9  In  London  there  are  sermons  in  stones,  certainly,  but 
not  'good  in  everything,'  an  observation  I  should  take  the  lib- 
erty of  making  to  the  Swan,  if  he  were  not  now,  alas !  'the 
baseless  fabric  of  a  vision.' " 

Pisistratus. — "Take  care!" 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  369 

Peacock  (hurriedly). — "Then  says  Mr.  Vivian,  'If  you  don't 
mind  wearing  a  livery,  till  I  can  provide  for  you  more  suitably, 
my  old  friend,  there's  a  vacancy  in  the  establishment  of  Mr. 
Trevanion.'  Sir,  I  accepted  the  proposal,  and  that's  why  I  wear 
this  livery." 

Pisisteatus. — "And,  pray,  what  business  had  you  with  that 
young  woman,  whom  I  take  to  be  Miss  Trevanion's  maid?  and 
why  should  she  come  from  Oxton  to  see  you?" 

I  had  expected  that  these  questions  would  confound  Mr. 
Peacock ;  but  if  there  were  really  anything  in  them  to  cause 
embarrassment,  the  ci-devant  actor  was  too  practised  in  his 
profession  to  exhibit  it.  He  merely  smiled,  and,  smoothing 
jauntily  a  very  tumbled  shirt-front,  he  said,  "  Oh,  sir,  fie ! 

'  Of  this  matter 
Is  little  Cupid's  crafty  arrow  made.' 

If  you  must  know  my  love  aiFairs,  that  young  woman  is,  as  the 
vulgar  say,  my  sweetheart." 

"  Your  sweetheart !"  I  exclaimed,  greatly  relieved,  and  ac- 
knowledging at  once  the  probability  of  the  statement.  "Yet," 
I  added,  suspiciously — "  yet,  if  so,  why  should  she  expect  Mr. 
Gower  to  write  to  her  ?" 

"  You're  quick  of  hearing,  sir ;  but  though 

'  All  adoration,  duty,  and  observance : 

All  humbleness,  and  patience,  and  impatience,' 

the  young  woman  won't  marry  a  livery  servant — proud  crea- 
ture ! — very  proud !  and  Mr.  Gower,  you  see,  knowing  how  it 
was,  felt  for  me,  and  told  her,  if  I  may  take  such  liberty  with 
the  Swan,  that  she  should 

'  Never  lie  by  Johnson's  side 

With  an  unquiet  soul ;' 

for  that  he  would  get  me  a  place  in  the  Stamps !  The  silly 
girl  said  she  would  have  it  in  black  and  white — as  if  Mr.  Gow- 
er would  write  to  her ! 

"And  now,  sir,"  continued  Mr.  Peacock,  with  a  simpler 
gravity,  "  you  are  at  liberty,  of  course,  to  say  what  you  please 
to  my  lady,  but  I  hope  you'll  not  try  to  take  the  bread  out  of 
my  mouth  because  I  wear  a  livery,  and  am  fool  enough  to  be 
in  love  with  a  waiting-woman — I,  sir,  who  could  have  married 
ladies  who  have  played  the  first  parts  in  life — on  the  metro- 
politan stage." 

I  had  nothing  to  say  to  these  representations — thev  seemed 
Q2 


:f7<)  mi;  «  wtmns  : 

plausible;  and  though  a1  lirst  I  had  suspected  that  the  man 
had  only  resorted  to  the  buffoonery  of  his  quotations  in  order 
to  gain  time  for  invention,  or  to  divert  my  notice  from  any  flaw 
in  the  narrative,  yel  at  the  close,  as  the  narrative  seemed  prob- 
able, s.»  I  Mas  willing  to  believe  the  buffoonery  was  merely 
characteristic.     I  contented  myself,  therefore,  with  asking — 

"  Where  do  you  come  from  now?" 

k>  From  Mr.  Trevanion,  in  the  country,  with  letters  to  Lady 
Ellinor." 

"  Oh !  and  so  the  young  woman  knew  you  were  coming  to 
town?" 

L-  Yes,  sir ;  Mr.  Trevanion  told  me  some  days  ago,  the  day  I 
should  have  to  start." 

"And  what  do  you  and  the  young  woman  propose  doing  to- 
morrow, if  there  is  no  change  of  plan  ?" 

Here  I  certainly  thought  there  was  a  slight,  scarce  percepti- 
ble, alteration  in  Mr.  Peacock's  countenance,  but  he  answered 
readily,  "To-morrow,  a  little  assignation,  if  Ave  can  both  get 
out — 

'  Woo  me,  now  I  am  in  a  holiday  humour, 
And  like  enough  to  consent.' 

Swan  again,  sir." 

"  Humph  ! — so  then  Mr.  Gower  and  Mr.  Vivian  are  the  same 
person  ?" 

Peacock  hesitated.  "That's  not  my  secret,  sir;  cIam  com- 
bined by  a  sacred  vow.'  You  are  too  much  the  gentleman  to 
peep  through  the  blanket  of  the  dark,  and  to  ask  me,  who  wear 
the  whips  and  stripes — I  mean  the  plush  small-clothes  and 
shoulder-knots — the  secrets  of  another  gent,  to  'whom  my 
services  are  bound.' " 

How  a  man  past  thirty  foils  a  man  scarcely  twenty! — what 
superiority  the  mere  fact  of  living-on  gives  to  the  dullest  dog! 
1  bit  my  lip  and  was  silent. 

"And,"  pursued  Mr.  Peacock,  "if  you  knew  how  the  Mr. 
Yivi:in  you  inquired  after  loves  you!  When  I  told  him  inci- 
dentally, how  a  young  gentleman  had  come  behind  the  scenes 
to  inquire  alter  him,  lie  made  me  describe  you,  and  then  said, 
quite  mournfully,  'If  ever  1  am  what  I  hope  to  become,  how 
happy  I  shall  be  to  Bhake  that  kind  hand  once  more,' — very 
Words,  sir  ! — honour  bright  ! 

'  T  think  these's  ne'er  a  man  in  Christendom 
Can  lesser  hide  Ids  hate  <>r  love  than  lie.' 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  3  V  1 

And  if  Mr.  Vivian  has  some  reason  to  keep  himself  concealed 
still — if  his  fortune  or  ruin  depend  on  your  not  divulging  his 
secret  for  a  while — I  can't  think  you  are  the  man  he  need  fear. 
'Pon  my  life, 

'I  wish  I  was  as  sure  of  a  good  dinner,' 
as  the  Swan  touchingly  exclaims.     I  dare  swear  that  was  a 
wish  often  on  the  Swan's  lips  in  the  privacy  of  his  domestic 
life !" 

My  heart  was  softened,  not  by  the  pathos  of  the  much  pro- 
faned and  desecrated  Swan,  but  by  Mr.  Peacock's  unadorned 
repetition  of  Vivian's  words.  I  turned  my  face  from  the  sharp 
eyes  of  my  companion — the  cab  now  stopped  at  the  foot  of 
London  Bridge. 

I  had  no  more  to  ask,  yet  still  there  was  some  uneasy  curios- 
ity in  my  mind,  which  I  could  hardly  define  to  myself, — was  it 
not  jealousy  ?  Vivian  so  handsome  and  so  daring — he  at  least 
might  see  the  great  heiress ;  Lady  Ellinor  perhaps  thought  of 
no  danger  there.  But — I — I  was  a  lover  still,  and — nay,  such 
thoughts  were  folly  indeed ! 

"  My  man,"  said  I  to  the  ex-comedian,  "  I  neither  wish  to 
harm  Mr.  Vivian  (if  I  am  so  to  call  him),  nor  you  who  imitate 
him  in  the  variety  of  your  names.  But  I  tell  you  fairly,  that  I 
do  not  like  your  being  in  Mr.  Trevanion's  employment,  and  I 
advise  you  to  get  out  of  it  as  soon  as  possible.  I  say  nothing 
more  as  yet,  for  I  shall  take  time  to  consider  well  what  you 
have  told  me." 

With  that  I  hastened  away,  and  Mr.  Peacock  continued  his 
solitary  journey  over  London  Bridge. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

Amidst  all  that  lacerated  my  heart,  or  tormented  my 
thoughts,  that  eventful  day,  I  felt  at  least  one  joyous  emotion, 
when,  on  entering  our  little  drawing-room,  I  found  my  uncle 
seated  there. 

The  Captain  had  placed  before  him  on  the  table  a  large  Bi- 
ble, borrowed  from  the  landlady.  He  never  travelled,  to  be 
sure,  without  his  own  Bible,  but  the  print  of  that  was  small, 
and  the  Captain's  eyes  began  to  fail  him  at  night.  So  this  was 
a  Bible  with  large  type ;  and  a  candle  was  placed  on  either 


372  nil'.  *  .whins  : 

Bide  of  it  ;  and  the  Captain  leant  his  elbows  on  the  table,  and 
both  his  hands  were  tightly  clasped  upon  his  forehead — tight- 
ly, as  if  to  Bhul  <»ut  the  tempter,  and  force  his  whole  soul  upon 
the  page. 

He  sat  the  image  of  iron  courage;  in  every  line  of  that  rigid 
form  there  was  resolution.  "I  will  not  listen  to  my  heart;  I 
will  read  the  Book,  and  learn  to  suffer  as  becomes  a  Christian 
man." 

There  was  such  a  pathos  in  the  stern  sufferer's  attitude, 
that  it  spoke  those  words  as  plainly  as  if  his  lips  had  said 
them. 

Old  soldier !  thou  hast  done  a  soldier's  part  in  many  a  bloody 
field ;  but  if  I  could  make  visible  to  the  world  thy  brave  sol- 
dier's soul,  I  would  paint  thee  as  I  saw  thee  then ! — Out  on 
this  tyro's  hand ! 

At  the  movement  I  made,  the  Captain  looked  up,  and  the 
strife  he  had  gone  through  was  written  upon  his  face. 

"It  has  done  me  good,"  said  he,  simply,  and  he  closed  the 
book. 

I  drew  my  chair  near  to  him,  and  hung  my  arm  over  Ins 
shoulder. 

"  No  cheering  news,  then  ?"  asked  I,  in  a  whisper. 

Roland  shook  his  head,  and  gently  laid  his  finger  on  his  lips. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

It  was  impossible  for  me  to  intrude  upon  Roland's  thoughts, 
whatever  their  nature,  with  a  detail  of  those  circumstances 
which  had  roused  in  me  a  keen  and  anxious  interest  in  things 
apart  from  his  sorrow. 

Yet  as  "restless  I  roll'd  around  my  weary  bed,"  and  re- 
volved the  renewal  of  Vivian's  connection  with  a  man  of  char- 
acter so  equivocal  as  Peacock,  the  establishment  of  an  able  and 
unscrupulous  tool  of  his  own  in  the  service  of  Trevanion,  the 
care  with  which  he  had  concealed  from  me  his  change  of 
name,  and  his  intimacy  at  the  very  house  to  which  I  had 
frankly  offered  to  present  him;  the  familiarity  which  his  crea- 
ture had  contrived  to  effect  with  Miss  Trevanion's  maid,  the 
words  that  had  passed  between  them — plausibly  accounted 
for,  it  is  true,  yet  still   suspicious — and,  above  all,  my  painful 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  3*73 

recollections  of  Vivian's  reckless  ambition  and  unprincipled 
sentiments — nay,  the  effect  that  a  few  random  words  upon 
Fanny's  fortune,  and  the  luck  of  winning  an  heiress,  had  suf- 
ficed to  produce  upon  his  heated  fancy  and  audacious  temper : 
when  all  these  thoughts  came  upon  me,  strong  and  vivid,  in 
the  darkness  of  night,  I  longed  for  some  confidant,  more  ex- 
perienced in  the  world  than  myself,  to  advise  me  as  to  the 
course  I  ought  to  pursue.  Should  I  warn  Lady  Ellinor  ?  But 
of  what  ? — the  character  of  a  servant,  or  the  designs  of  the  fic- 
titious Gower  ?  Against  the  first  I  could  say,  if  nothing  very 
positive,  still  enough  to  make  it  prudent  to  dismiss  him.  But 
of  Gower  or  Vivian,  what  could  I  say  without — not  indeed  be- 
traying his  confidence,  for  that  he  had  never  given  me — but 
without  belying  the  professions  of  friendship  that  I  myself  had 
lavishly  made  to  him  ?  Perhaps,  after  all,  he  might  have  dis- 
closed whatever  were  his  real  secrets  to  Trevanion ;  and,  if 
not,  I  might  indeed  ruin  his  prospects  by  revealing  the  aliases 
he  assumed.  But  wherefore  reveal,  and  wherefore  warn? 
Because  of*  suspicions  that  I  could  not  myself  analyze — sus- 
picions founded  on  circumstances  most  of  which  had  already 
been  seemingly  explained  away.  Still,  when  morning  came,  I 
was  irresolute  what  to  do  ;  and  after  watching  Roland's  coun- 
tenance, and  seeing  on  his  brow  so  great  a  weight  of  care,  that 
I  had  no  option  but  to  postpone  the  confidence  I  pined  to  place 
in  his  strong  understanding  and  unerring  sense  of  honour,  I 
wandered  out,  hoping  that  in  the  fresh  air  I  might  recollect  my 
thoughts,  and  solve  the  problem  that  perplexed  me.  I  had 
enough  to  do  in  sundry  small  orders  for  my  voyage,  and  com- 
missions for  Bolding,  to  occupy  me  some  hours.  And,  this 
business  done,  I  found  myself  moving  westward :  mechanic- 
ally, as  if  it  were,  I  had  come  to  a  kind  of  half-and-half  resolu- 
tion to  call  upon  Lady  Ellinor,  and  question  her,  carelessly  and 
incidentally,  both  about  Gower  and  the  new  servant  admitted 
to  the  household. 

Thus  I  found  myself  in  Regent  Street,  when  a  carriage, 
borne  by  post-horses,  whirled  rapidly  over  the  pavement — 
scattering  to  the  right  and  left  all  humbler  equipages — and 
hurried,  as  if  on  an  errand  of  life  and  death,  up  the  broad  thor- 
oughfare leading  into  Portland  Place.  But,  rapidly  as  the 
wheels  dashed  by,  I  had  seen  distinctly  the  face  of  Fanny  Tre- 
vanion in  the  carriage,  and  that  face  wore  a  strange  expression, 


:;'."  I  i  in:   <  A.XTONS  : 

which  Beemed  to  me  to  speak  of  anxiety  and  grief;  ami,  by 
her  Bide — was  doI  that  the  woman  I  had  Been  with  Peacock? 
I  did  do!  Bee  the  face  of  the  woman,  but  I  thought  I  recognized 

the  cloak,  the  bonnet,  and  peculiar  turn  of  the  head.  If  1  could 
be  mistaken  there,  1  was  not  mistaken  at  least  as  to  the  serv- 
ant on  the  seat  behind.  Looking  back  at  a  butcher's  boy, 
who  had  just  escaped  being  run  over,  and  was  revenging  him- 
self by  all  the  imprecations  the  Dirse  of  London  slang  could 
suggest,  the  lace  of  Mr.  Peacock  was  exposed  in  full  to  my 
gaze. 

My  first  impulse,  on  recovering  my  surprise,  was  to  spring 
after  the  carriage  ;  in  the  haste  of  that  impulse,  I  cried  "  Stop !" 
But  the  carriage  was  out  of  sight  in  a  moment,  and  my  word 
was  lost  in  air.  Full  of  presentiments  of  some  evil — I  knew 
not  what — I  then  altered  my  course,  and  stopped  not,  till  I 
found  myself,  panting  and  out  of  breath,  in  St.  James's  Square 
— at  the  door  of  Trevanion' s  house — in  the  hall.  The  porter 
had  a  newspaper  in  his  hand  as  he  admitted  me. 

"  Where  is  Lady  Ellinor  ? — I  must  see  her  instantly." 

"  Xo  worse  news  of  master,  I  hope,  sir  ?" 

"  Worse  news  of  what  ? — of  whom  ? — of  Mr.  Trevanion  ?" 

"  Did  .you  not  know  he  was  taken  suddenly  ill,  sir ;  that  a 
servant  came  express  to  say  so  last  night  ?  Lady  Ellinor  went 
off  at  ten  o'clock  to  join  him." 

"  At  ten  o'clock  last  night  ?" 

"  Yes,  sir ;  the  servant's  account  alarmed  her  ladyship  so 
much." 

"The  new  servant,  who  had  been  recommended  by  Mr. 
Sower?" 

"Yes,  sir  —  Henry,"  answered  the  porter,  staring  at  me. 
"Please,  sir,  here  is  an  account  of  master's  attack  in  the  paper. 
I  suppose  Henry  took  it  to  the  office  before  he  came  here, 
which  was  very  wrong  in  him  ;  but  I  am  afraid  he's  a  very 
foolish  fellow." 

••  Never  mind  that.  Miss  Trevanion — I  saw  her  just  now 
— she  did  not  go  with  her  mother :  where  was  she  goinir, 
then?" 

"  Why,  sir — but  pray  step  into  the  parlour." 

■•  Xo.  no — speak  !" 

••  Why,  sir,  before  Lady  Ellinor  set  out,  she  was  afraid  that 
there  might  be  something  in  the  papers  to  alarm  Miss  Fanny, 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  3f5 

and  so  she  sent  Henry  down  to  Lady  Castleton's,  to  beg  her 
ladyship  to  make  as  light  of  it  as  she  could ;  but  it  seems  that 
Henry  blabbed  the  worst  to  Mrs.  Mole." 

"Who  is  Mrs.  Mole?" 

"  Miss  Trevanion's  maid,  sir — a  new  maid ;  and  Mrs.  Mole 
blabbed  to  my  young  lady,  and  so  she  took  fright,  and  insisted 
on  coming  to  town.  And  Lady  Castleton,  who  is  ill  herself 
in  bed,  could  not  keep  her,  I  suppose, — especially  as  Henry 
said,  though  he  ought  to  have  known  better,  '  that  she  would 
be  in  time  to  arrive  before  my  lady  set  off.'  Poor  Miss  Tre- 
vanion  was  so  disappointed  when  she  found,  her  mamma  gone. 
And  then  she  would  order  fresh  horses,  and  would  go  on, 
though  Mrs.  Bates  (the  housekeeper,  you  know,  sir)  was  very 
angry  with  Mrs.  Mole,  who  encouraged  Miss ;  and" — 

"  Good  heavens !     Why  did  not  Mrs.  Bates  go  with  her  ?" 

"  Why,  sir,  you  know  how  old  Mrs.  Bates  is,  and  my  young 
lady  is  always  so  kind  that  she  would  not  hear  of  it,  as  she  is 
going  to  travel  night  and  day ;  and  Mrs.  Mole  said  she  had 
gone  all  over  the  world  with  her  last  lady,  and  that" — 

"  I  see  it  all.     Where  is  Mr.  Gower  ?" 

"Mr.  Gower,  sir?" 

"  Yes !     Can't  you  answer?" 

"  Why,  with  Mr.  Trevanion,  I  believe,  sir." 

"  In  the  north — what  is  the  address  ?" 

"Lord  N ,  C Hall,  near  W ." 

I  heard  no  more. 

The  conviction  of  some  villanous  snare  struck  me  as  with 
the  swiftness  and  force  of  lightning.  Why,  if  Trevanion  were 
really  ill,  had  the  false  servant  concealed  it  from  me?  Why 
suffered  me  to  waste  his  time,  instead  of  hastening  to  Lady 
Ellinor  ?  How,  if  Mr.  Trevanion's  sudden  illness  had  brought 
the  man  to  London — how  had  he  known  so  long  beforehand 
(as  he  himself  told  me,  and  his  appointment  with  the  waiting- 
woman  proved)  the  day  he  should  arrive?  Why  now,  if  there 
were  no  design  of  which  Miss  Trevanion  was  the  object — why 
so  frustrate  the  provident  foresight  of  her  mother,  and  take 
advantage  of  the  natural  yearning  of  affection,  the  quick  im- 
pulse of  youth,  to  hurry  off  a  girl  whose  very  station  forbade 
her  to  take  such  a  journey  without  suitable  protection — against 
what  must  be  the  wish,  and  what  clearly  were  the  instructions, 
of  Lady  Ellinor  ?     Alone,  worse  than  alone !     Fanny  Trevan- 


370  Tin:  cantons : 

ion  was  then  in  the  hands  of  two  servants,  who  wore  the  in- 
struments and  confidants  of  an  adventurer  like  Vivian;  and 
that  conference  between  those  servants — those  broken  refer- 
ences to  the  morrow,  coupled  with  the  name  Vivian  had  as- 
sumed :  needed  the  unerring  instincts  of  love  more  cause  for 
tenor? — terror  the  darker,  because  the  exact  shape  it  should 
assume  was  obscure  and  indistinct. 

I  sprang  from  the  house.' 

I  hastened  into  the  Ilaymarket,  summoned  a  cabriolet,  drove 
home  as  fast  as  I  could  (for  I  had  no  money  about  me  for  the 
journey  I  meditated) ;  sent  the  servant  of  the  lodging  to  en- 
gage a  ehaise-and-four,  rushed  into  the  room,  where  Roland 
fortunately  still  was,  and  exclaimed — "  Uncle,  come  with  me ! 
take  money,  plenty  of  money ! — some  villany,  I  know,  though 
I  can't  explain  it,  has  been  practised  on  the  Trevanions.  We 
may  defeat  it  yet.     I  will  tell  you  all  by  the  way — come,  come !" 

"  Certainly.  But  villany ! — and  to  people  of  such  a  station 
— pooh ! — collect  yourself.     Who  is  the  villain  ?" 

"  Oh,  the  man  I  had  loved  as  a  friend — the  man  whom  I 
myself  helped  to  make  known  to  Trevanion  —  Vivian — Viv- 
ian!" 

"  Vivian ! — ah,  the  youth  I  have  heard  you  speak  of.  But 
how  ? — villany  to  whom — to  Trevanion  ?" 

"  You  torture  me  with  your  questions.  Listen — this  Vivian 
(I  know  him) — he  has  introduced  into  the  house,  as  a  servant, 
an  agent  capable  of  any  trick  and  fraud ;  that  servant  has  aid- 
ed him  to  win  over  her  maid — Fanny's — Miss  Trevanion's. 
Miss  Trevanion  is  an  heiress,  Vivian  an  adventurer.  My  head 
swims  round,  I  cannot  explain  now.  Ha!  I  will  write  a  line 
to  Lord  Castleton — tell  him  my  fears  and  suspicions — he  will 
follow  us,  I  know,  or  do  what  is  best." 

I  drew  ink  and  paper  towards  me,  and  wrote  hastily.  My 
uncle  came  round  and  looked,  over  my  shoulder. 

Suddenly  lie  exclaimed,  seizing  my  arm,  "Gower,  Gower! 
You  said  'Vivian.' " 

"  Vivian  or  Gower — the  same  person." 

My  uncle  hurried  out  of  the  room.  It  was  natural  that  he 
should  leave  me  to  make  our  joint  and  brief  preparations  for 
departure. 

I  finished  my  letter,  sealed  it,  and  when,  five  minutes  after- 
wards, the  chaise  came  to  the  door,  I  gave  it  to  the  ostler  who 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  377 

accompanied  the  horses,  with  injunctions  to  deliver  it  forth- 
with to  Lord  Castleton  himself. 

My  uncle  now  descended,  and  stepped  from  the  threshold 
with  a  firm  stride.  "  Comfort  yourself,"  he  said,  as  he  entered 
the  chaise,  into  which  I  had  already  thrown  myself.  "  We 
may  be  mistaken  yet." 

"  Mistaken !  You  do  not  know  this  young  man.  He  has 
every  quality  that  could  entangle  a  girl  like  Fanny,  and  not, 
I  fear,  one  sentiment  of  honour,  that  would  stand  in  the  way 
of  his  ambition.  I  judge  him  now  as  by  a  revelation — too  late 
— oh  Heavens,  if  it  be  too  late." 

A  groan  broke  from  Roland's  lips.  I  heard  in  it  a  proof 
of  sympathy  with  my  emotion,  and  grasped  his  hand ;  it  was 
as  cold  as  the  hand  of  the  dead. 


PAET  FIFTEENTH. 

CHAPTER  I. 

There  would  have  been  nothing  in  what  had  chanced  to 
justify  the  suspicions  that  tortured  me,  but  for  my  impressions 
as  to  the  character  of  Vivian. 

Reader,  hast  thou  not,  in  the  easy,  careless  sociability  of 
youth,  formed  acquaintance  with  some  one,  in  whose  more  en- 
gaging or  brilliant  qualities  thou  hast — not  lost  that  dislike  to 
delects  or  vices  which  is  natural  to  an  age  when,  even  while 
we  err,  we  adore  what  is  good,  and  glow  with  enthusiasm  for 
the  ennobling  sentiment  and  the  virtuous  deed — no,  happily, 
not  lost  dislike  to  what  is  bad,  nor  thy  quick  sense  of  it — but 
conceived  a  keen  interest  in  the  struggle  between  the  bad  that 
revolted,  and  the  good  that  attracted  thee,  in  thy  companion  ? 
Then,  perhaps,  thou  hast  lost  sight  of  him  for  a  time — sudden- 
ly thou  hearest  that  he  has  done  something  out  of  the  way  of 
ordinary  good  or  commonplace  evil;  and,  in  either — the  good 
or  the  evil — thy  mind  runs  rapidly  back  over  its  old  reminis- 
cences, and  of  either  thou  sayest, "  How  natural ! — only  So-and- 
so  could  have  done  this  thing!" 

Thus  I  felt  respecting  Vivian.  The  most  remarkable  quali- 
ties in  his  character  were  his  keen  power  of  calculation,  and 
his  unhesitating  audacity — qualities  that  lead  to  fame  or  to  in- 
famy, according  to  the  cultivation  of  the  moral  sense  and  the 
direction  of  the  passions.  Had  I  recognized  those  qualities  in 
some  agency  apparently  of  good — and  it  seemed  yet  doubtful 
if  Vivian  were  the  agent — I  should  have  cried,  "It  is  he!  and 
the  better  angel  lias  triumphed!"  With  the  same  (alas!  with 
a  yel  more  impulsive)  quickness,  when  the  agency  was  of  evil, 
and  the  agent  equally  dubious,  I  felt  that  the  qualities  revealed 
the  man,  and  that  the  demon  had  prevailed. 

.Mile  after  mile,  stage  after  stage,  were  passed,  on  the  dreary, 
interminable, high  north  road.     I  narrated  t<>  my  companion, 

more  intelligibly  than  I  had  yet  <l<»nc  my  causes  for  apprehen- 
Bion.      The  Captain  at  first  listened  eagerly,  then   checked  me 


THE    CAXT0NS.  379 

on  the  sudden.  "  There  may  be  nothing  in  all  this  !"  he  cried. 
"  Sir,  we  must  be  men  here— have  our  heads  cool,  our  reason 
clear ;  stop  !"  And,  leaning  back  in  the  chaise,  Roland  refused 
further  conversation,  and,  as  the  night  advanced,  seemed  to 
sleep.  I  took  pity  on  his  fatigue,  and  devoured  my  heart  in 
silence.  At  each  stage  we  heard  of  the  party  of  which  we 
were  in  pursuit.  At  the  first  stage  or  two  we  were  less  than 
an  hour  behind ;  gradually,  as  we  advanced,  we  lost  ground, 
despite  the  most  lavish  liberality  to  the  post-boys.  I  supposed, 
at  length,  that  the  mere  circumstance  of  changing,  at  each  re- 
lay, the  chaise  as  well  as  the  horses,  was  the  cause  of  our  com- 
parative slowness ;  and,  on  saying  this  to  Roland,  as  we  were 
changing  horses,  somewhere  about  midnight,  he  at  once  called 
up  the  master  of  the  inn,  and  gave  him  his  own  price  for  per- 
mission to  retain  the  chaise  till  the  journey's  end.  This  was 
so  unlike  Roland's  ordinary  thrift,  whether  dealing  with  my 
money  or  his  own — so  unjustified  by  the  fortune  of  either — 
that  I  could  not  help  muttering  something  in  apology. 

"Can  you  guess  why  I  was  a  miser?"  said  Roland,  calmly. 

"  A  miser ! — anything  but  that !  Only  prudent — military 
men  often  are  so." 

"I  was  a  miser,"  repeated  the  Captain,  with  emphasis.  "I 
began  the  habit  first  when  my  son  was  but  a  child.  I  thought 
him  high-spirited,  and  with  a  taste  for  extravagance.  'Well,' 
said  I  to  myself,  'I  will  save  for  him;  boys  will  be  boys.' 
Then,  afterwards,  when  he  was  no  more  a  child  (at  least  he  be- 
gan to  have  the  vices  of  a  man),  I  said  to  myself,  '  Patience,  he 
may  reform  still ;  if  not,  I  will  save  money,  that  I  may  have 
power  over  his  self-interest,  since  I  have  none  over  his  heart. 
I  will  bribe  him  into  honour  !'  And  then — and  then — God  saw 
that  I  Avas  very  proud,  and  I  was  punished.  Tell  them  to 
drive  faster — faster — why,  this  is  a  snail's  pace  !" 

All  that  night,  all  the  next  day,  till  towards  the  evening,  we 
pursued  our  journey,  without  pause,  or  other  food  than  a  crust 
of  bread  and  a  glass  of  wine.  But  we  now  picked  up  the 
ground  we  had  lost,  and  gained  upon  the  carriage.  The  night 
had  closed  in  when  we  arrived  at  the  stage  at  which  the  route 

to  Lord  N" 's  branched  from  the  direct  north  road.     And 

here,  making  our  usual  inquiry,  my  worst  suspicions  were  con- 
firmed. The  carriage  we  pursued  had  changed  horses  an  hour 
before,  but  had  not  taken  the  way  to  Lord  N 's ; — contin- 


380  the  caxtons: 

uing  the  direct  road  into  Scotland.    The  people  of  the  inn  had 
doI  Been  the  lady  in  the  carriage,  for  it  was  already  dark,  but « 
the  man-servant  (whose  livery  they  described)  had  ordered  the 
horses. 

The  last  hope  that,  in  spite  of  appearances,  no  treachery  had 
been  designed,  here  vanished.  The  Captain,  at  first,  seemed 
more  dismayed  than  myself,  but  he  recovered  more  quickly. 
"  We  will  continue  the  journey  on  horseback,"  he  said;  and 
hurried  to  the  stables.  All  objection  vanished  at  the  sight  of 
his  gold.  In  five  minutes  we  were  in  the  saddle,  with  a  pos- 
tilion, also  mounted,  to  accompany  us.  We  did  the  next  stage 
in  little  more  than  two-thirds  of  the  time  which  we  should  have 
occupied  in  our  former  mode  of  travel — indeed,  I  found  it  hard 
to  keep  pace  with  Roland.  We  remounted;  we  were  only 
twenty-five  minutes  behind  the  carriage.  We  felt  confident 
that  we  should  overtake  it  before  it  could  reach  the  next  town 
— the  moon  was  up — we  could  see  far  before  us — we  rode  at 
full  speed.  Milestone  after  milestone  glided  by ;  the  carriage 
was  not  visible.  We  arrived  at  the  post-town,  or  rather  vil- 
lage ;  it  contained  but  one  posting-house.  We  were  long  in 
knocking  up  the  ostlers — no  carriage  had  arrived  just  before 
us  ;  no  carriage  had  passed  the  place  since  noon. 

What  mystery  was  this  ? 

"  Back,  back  boy !"  said  Roland,  with  a  soldier's  quick  wit, 
and  spurring  his  jaded  horse  from  the  yard.  "They  will  have 
taken  a  cross-road  or  bye-lane.  We  shall  track  them  by  the 
hoofs  of  the  horses,  or  the  print  of  the  wheels." 

Our  postilion  grumbled,  and  pointed  to  the  panting  sides 
of  our  horses.  For  answer,  Roland  opened  his  hand — full  of 
gold.  Away  we  went  back  through  the  dull  sleeping  village, 
back  into  the  broad  moonlit  thoroughfare.  We  came  to  a 
cross-road  to  the  right,  but  the  track  we  pursued  still  led  us 
straight  on.  We  had  measured  back  nearly  half  the  way  to 
the  post-town  at  which  we  had  last  changed,  when  lo !  there 
emerged  from  a  bye-lane  two  postilions  and  their  horses! 

At  that  sight  our  companion,  shouting  loud,  pushed  on  be- 
fore us  and  hailed  his  fellows.  A  few  words  gave  us  the  in- 
formation we  sought.  A  Avhcel  had  come  off  the  carriage  just 
by  the  turn  of  the  road,  and  the  young  lady  and  her  servants 
had  taken  refuge  in  a  small  inn  not  many  yards  down  the  lane. 
The  man-servant  had  dismissed  the  post-boys  after  they  had 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  381 

baited  their  horses,  saying  they  were  to  come  again  in  the 
morning,  and  bring  a  blacksmith  to  repair  the  wheel. 

"  How  came  the  wheel  off?"  asked  Roland,  sternly. 

"  Why,  sir,  the  linen-pin  was  all  rotted  away,  I  suppose,  and 
came  out." 

"  Did  the  servant  get  off  the  dickey  after  you  set  out,  and 
before  the  accident  happened  ?" 

"  Why,  yes.  He  said  the  wheels  were  catching  fire,  that 
they  had  not  the  patent  axles,  and  he  had  forgot  to  have  them 
oiled." 

"And  he  looked  at  the  wheels,  and  shortly  afterwards  the 
linen-pin  came  out  ?     Eh  ?" 

"Anan,  sir!"  said  the  post-boy,  staring;  "why,  and  indeed 
so  it  was !" 

"  Come  on,  Pisistratus,  we  are  in  time ;  but  pray  God^ — pray 
God — that" — the  Captain  dashed  his  spur  into  the  horse's 
sides,  and  the  rest  of  his  words  were  lost  to  me. 

A  few  yards  back  from  the  causeway,  a  broad  patch  of 
green  before  it,  stood  the  inn — a  sullen,  old-fashioned  building 
of  cold  gray  stone,  looking  livid  in  the  moonlight,  with  black 
firs  at  one  side,  throwing  over  half  of  it  a  dismal  shadow.  So 
solitary !  not  a  house,  not  a  hut  near  it.  If  they  who  kept  the 
inn  were  such  that  villany  might  reckon  on  their  connivance, 
and  innocence  despair  of  their  aid — there  was  no  neighbour- 
hood to  alarm — no  refuge  at  hand.     The  spot  was  well  chosen. 

The  doors  of  the  inn  were  closed ;  there  was  a  light  in  the 
room  below ;  but  the  outside  shutters  were  drawn  over  the 
windows  on  the  first  floor.  My  uncle  paused  a  moment,  and 
said  to  the  postilion — 

"  Do  you  know  the  back  way  to  the  premises  ?" 

w  Xo,  sir :  I  doesn't  often  come  by  this  way,  and  they  be  new 
folks  that  have  taken  the  house — and  I  hear  it  don't  prosper 
over  much." 

"  Knock  at  the  door ;  we  will  stand  a  little  aside  while  you 
do  so.  If  any  one  ask  what  you  want,  merely  say  you  would 
speak  to  the  servant — that  you  have  found  a  purse ; — here,  hold 
up  mine." 

Roland  and  I  had  dismounted,  and  my  uncle  drew  me  close 
to  the  wall  by  the  door.  Observing  that  my  impatience  ill 
submitted  to  what  seemed  to  me  idle  preliminaries, 

"  Hist !"  Avhispered  he ;  "  if  there  be  anything  to  conceal 


THE    CAXTOXS  '. 

within,  they  will  not  answer  the  door  till  sonic  one  has  recon- 
noitred ;  were  they  to  sec  us,  they  Mould  refuse  to  open.  But 
seeing  only  the  post-boy,  whom  they  will  suppose  a1  first  to 

lu'  our  of  those  who  brought  the  carriage,  they  will  have  no 
Busjficion.  I>e  ready  to  rush  in  the  moment  the  door  is  un- 
barred." 

My  uncle's  veteran  experience  did  not  deceive  him.  There 
was  a  long  silence  before  any  reply  was  made  to  the  post-boy's 
summons;  the  light  passed  to  and  fro  rapidly  across  the  win- 
dow, as  if  persons  were  moving  within.  Roland  made  Bign  to 
the  post-boy  to  knock  again ;  lie  did  so  twice — thrice — and  at 
last,  from  an  attic  window  in  the  roof,  a  head  obtruded,  and  a 
voice  cried,  "Who  are  you? — what  do  you  want?" 

"I'm  the  post-boy  at  the  Red  Lion ;  I  want  to  see  the  serv- 
ant with  the  brown  carriage :  I  have  found  this  purse  !" 

"  Oh,  that's  all— wait  a  bit." 

The  head  disappeared;  Ave  crept  along  under  the  projecting 
eaves  of  the  house ;  we  heard  the  bar  lifted  from  the  door ;  the 
door  itself  cautiously  opened;  one  spring  and  I  stood  within, 
and  set  ray  back  to  the  door  to  admit  Roland. 

"  Ho,  help  ! — thieves ! — help !"  cried  a  loud  voice,  and  I  felt 
a  hand  gripe  at  my  throat.  I  struck  at  random  in  the  dark, 
and  with  eifect,  for  my  blow  was  followed  by  a  groan  and  a 
curse. 

Roland,  meanwhile,  had  detected  a  ray  through  the  chinks 
of  a  door  in  the  hall,  and,  guided  by  it,  found  his  way  into  the 
room  at  the  window  of  which  we  had  seen  the  light  pass  and 
go,  while  without.  As  he  threw  the  door  open,  I  bounded 
alter  him,  and  saw,  in  a  kind  of  parlour,  two  females — the  one 
a  stranger,  no  doubt  the  hostess,  the  other  the  treacherous 
abigail.     Their  faces  evinced  their  terror. 

"  AVoman,"  I  said,  seizing  the  last,  "where  is  Miss  Trevan- 
ion?"  In-lead  of  replying,  the  woman  set  up  a  loud  shriek. 
Another  light  now  gleamed  from  the  staircase  which  immedi- 
ately  faced  the  door;  and  I  heard  a  voice,  that  I  recognized  as 
Peacock's,  cry  out,  "Who's  there ?— What's  the  matter?" 

T  made  a  rush  at  the  si  airs.  A  burly  form  (that  of  the  land- 
lord, who  had  recovered  from  ray  blow)  obstructed  ray  w  ay 
l'"i-  a  moment,  to  measure  its  length  on  the  floor  at  the  next. 
I  was  a1  the  to]»  of  the  stairs;  Peacock  recognized  me,  re- 
coiled, and   extinguished  the  light.      Oaths,  cries,  and  shrieks 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  383 

now  resounded  through  the  dark.  Amidst  them  all,  I  sudden- 
ly heard  a  voice  exclaim,  "  Here,  here  ! — help !"  It  was  the 
voice  of  Fanny.  I  made  my  way  to  the  right,  whence  the 
voice  came,  and  received  a  violent  blow.  Fortunately,  it  fell 
on  the  arm  which  I  extended,  as  men  do  who  feel  their  way 
through  the  dark.  It  was  not  the  right  arm,  and  I  seized  and 
closed  on  my  assailant.  Roland  now  came  up,  a  candle  in  his 
hand,  and  at  that  sight  my  antagonist,  who  was  no  other  than 
Peacock,  slipped  from  me,  and  made  a  rush  at  the  stairs.  But 
the  Captain  caught  him  with  his  grasp  of  iron.  Fearing  noth- 
ing for  Roland  in  a  contest  with  any  single  foe,  and  all  my 
thoughts  bent  on  the  rescue  of  her  whose  voice  again  broke 
on  my  ear,  I  had  already  (before  the  light  of  the  candle  which 
Roland  held  went  out  in  the  struggle  between  himself  and 
Peacock)  caught  sight  of  a  door  at  the  end  of  the  passage, 
and  thrown  myself  against  it :  it  was  locked,  but  it  shook  and 
groaned  to  my  pressure. 

"Hold  back,  whoever  you  are,"  cried  a  voice  from  the  room 
■within,  far  different  from  that  wail  of  distress  which  had  guid- 
ed my  steps.     "  Hold  back,  at  the  peril  of  your  life !" 

The  voice,  the  threat,  redoubled  my  strength ;  the  door  flew 
from  its  fastenings.  I  stood  in  the  room.  I  saw  Fanny  at  my 
feet,  clasping  my  hands ;  then,  raising  herself,  she  hung  on  my 
shoulder,  and  murmured,  "  Saved !"  Opposite  to  me,  his  face 
deformed  by  passion,  his  eyes  literally  blazing  with  savage  fire, 
his  nostrils  distended,  his  lips  apart,  stood  the  man  I  have  call- 
ed Francis  Vivian. 

"Fanny — Miss  Trevanion — what  outrage — what  villany  is 
this?  You  have  not  met  this  man  at  your  free  choice — oh 
speak !"     Vivian  sprang  forward. 

"  Question  no  one  but  me.  Unhand  that»lady — she  is  my 
betrothed — shall  be  my  wife." 

"  No,  no,  no, — don't  believe  him,"  cried  Fanny  ;  "  I  have 
been  betrayed  by  my  own  servants — brought  here,  I  know  not 
how !  I  heard  my  father  was  ill;  I  was  on  my  way  to  him: 
that  man  met  me  here,  and  dared  to — " 

"  Miss  Trevanion — yes,  I  dared  to  say  I  loved  you." 

"  Protect  me  from  him ! — you  will  protect  me  from  him  ?" 

"  No,  madam !"  said  a  voice  behind  me,  in  a  deep  tone,  "it 
is  I  who  claim  the  right  to  protect  you  from  that  man  ;  it  is  I 
who  now  draw  around  you  the  arm  of  one  sacred,  even  to  him; 


384  i  in:  I  axtons: 

it  la  I  who,  from  tliis  spot,  launch  upon  his  head — a  father's 
curse.  Violator  of  the  hearth!  baffled  ravisher!  go  thy  way 
to  tlio  doom  which  thou  hast  chosen  for  thyself.  God  will  be 
merciful  to  me  yet,  and  one  me  a  grave  before  thy  course  find 
its  close  in  the  hulks — or  at  the  gallows!" 

A  sickness  came  over  me — a  terror  froze  my  veins — I  reeled 
Lack,  and  leant  for  support  against  the  wall.  Roland  had 
passed  his  arm  round  Fanny,  and  she,  frail  and  trembling,  clung 
to  his  broad  breast,  looking  fearfully  up  to  his  face.  And  nev- 
er in  that  face,  ploughed  by  deep  emotions,  and  dark  with  un- 
utterable sorrows,  had  I  seen  an  expression  so  grand  in  its 
wrath,  so  sublime  in  its  despair.  Following  the  direction  of 
his  eyes,  stern  and  fixed  as  the  look  of  one  who  prophesies  a 
destiny  and  denounces  a  doom,  I  shivered  as  I  gazed  upon  the 
son.  His  whole  frame  seemed  collapsed  and  shrinking,  as  if 
already  withered  by  the  curse ;  a  ghastly  whiteness  overspread 
the  cheek,  usually  glowing  with  the  dark  bloom  of  oriental 
youth ;  the  knees  knocked  together ;  and,  at  last,  with  a  faint 
exclamation  of  pain,  like  the  cry  of  one  who  receives  a  death- 
blow, he  bowed  his  face  over  his  clasped  hands,  and  so  remain- 
ed— still,  but  cowering. 

Instinctively  I  advanced,  and  placed  myself  between  the  fa- 
ther and  the  son,  murmuring,  "  Spare  him ;  see,  his  own  heart 
crushes  him  down."  Then  stealing  towards  the  son,  I  whis- 
pered, "  Go,  go ;  the  crime  was  not  committed,  the  curse  can 
be  recalled."  But  my  words  touched  a  wrong  chord  in  that 
dark  and  rebellious  nature.  The  young  man  withdrew  his 
hands  hastily  from  his  face  and  reared  his  front  in  passionate 
defiance. 

Waving  me  aside,  he  cried,  "Away!  I  acknowledge  no  au- 
thority over  my  actions  and  my  fate;  I  allow  no  mediator  be- 
tween this  lady  and  myself.  Sir,"  he  continued,  gazing  gloom- 
ily on  his  father — "  sir,  you  forget  our  compact.  Our  ties 
were  severed,  your  power  over  me  annulled;  I  resigned  the 
name  you  bear:  to  you  I  was,  and  am  still,  as  the  dead.  I 
deny  your  right  to  step  between  me  and  the  object  dearer  to 
me  than  life. 

"  Oh  !"  (and  here  he  stretched  forth  his  hands  towards  Fan- 
ny)— "  Oh,  Miss  Trevamon,  do  not  refuse  me  one  prayer,  how- 
ever you  condemn  me.  Let  me  see  you  alone  but  for  one  mo- 
ment ;  lei  me  but  prove  to  you  that,  guilty  as  T  may  have  been, 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  385 

it  was  not  from  the  base  motives  you  will  hear  imputed  to  me 
— that  it  was  not  the  heiress  I  sought  to  decoy,  it  was  the 
woman  I  sought  to  win ;  oh,  hear  me — " 

"  No,  no,"  murmured  Fanny,  clinging  closer  to  Roland,  "  do 
not  leave  me.  If,  as  it  seems,  he  is  your  son,  I  forgive  him ; 
but  let  him  go — I  shudder  at  his  very  voice  !" 

"  Would  you  have  me,  indeed,  annihilate  the  memory  of  the 
bond  between  us  ?"  said  Roland,  in  a  hollow  voice ;  "  would 
you  have  me  see  in  you  only  the  vile  thief,  the  lawless  felon, 
— deliver  you  up  to  justice,  or  strike  you  to  my  feet  ?  Let  the 
memory  still  save  you,  and  begone  !" 

Again  I  caught  hold  of  the  guilty  son,  and  again  he  broke 
from  my  grasp. 

"  It  is,"  he  said,  folding  his  arms  deliberately  on  his  breast — 
"  it  is  for  me  to  command  in  this  house ;  all  who  are  within  it 
must  submit  to  my  orders.  You,  sir,  who  hold  reputation, 
name,  and  honour,  at  so  high  a  price,  how  can  you  fail  to  see 
that  you  would  rob  them  from  the  lady  whom  you  would  pro- 
tect from  the  insult  of  my  aifection  ?  How  would  the  world 
receive  the  tale  of  your  rescue  of  Miss  Trevanion  ?  how  believe 
that — oh,  pardon  me,  madam — Miss  Trevanion — Fanny — par- 
don me — I  am  mad;  only  hear  me — alone — alone — and  then 
if  you,  too,  say  '  Begone,'  I  submit  without  a  murmur  ;  I  allow 
no  arbiter  but  you." 

But  Fanny  still  clung  closer,  and  closer  still,  to  Roland.  At 
that  moment  I  heard  voices  and  the  trampling  of  feet  below, 
and  supposing  that  the  accomplices  in  this  villany  were  mus- 
tering courage,  perhaps,  to  mount  to  the  assistance  of  their 
employer,  I  lost  all  the  compassion  that  had  hitherto  softened 
my  horror  of  the  young  man's  crime,  and  all  the  awe  with 
which  that  confession  had  been  attended.  I  therefore,  this 
time,  seized  the  false  Vivian  with  a  gripe  that  he  could  no 
longer  shake  off,  and  said  sternly — 

"  Beware  how  you  aggravate  your  offence.  If  strife  ensues, 
it  will  not  be  between  father  and  son,  and — " 

Fanny  sprang  forward.  "  Do  not  provoke  this  bad,  dauger- 
ous  man.    I  fear  him  not.    Sir,  I  will  hear  you,  and  alone." 

"  Never !"  cried  I  and  Roland  simultaneously. 

Vivian  turned  his  look  fiercely  gh  me,  and  with  a  sullen  bit- 
terness to  his  father,  and  then,  as  if  resigning  his  former  pray- 
er, he  said — "  Well,  then,  be  it  so  ;  even  in  the  presence  of  those 

• 


386  Tin:  CAXTON8 : 

who  judge  me  bo  severely,  r  will  speak,  at  least."  He  paused, 
an<l  throwing  into  his  voice  a  passion  that,  had  the  repugnance 

at  his  guilt  been  less,  would  not  have  been  without  pathos,  he 
continued  to  address  Fanny:  tw  I  own  that,  when  I  first  saw 
you,  I  might  have  thought  of  love,  as  the  poor  and  ambitious 
think  of  the  way  to  wealth  and  power.  Those  thoughts  van- 
ished, and  nothing  remained  in  my  heart  but  love  and  madness. 
I  was  as  a  man  in  a  delirium  when  I  planned  this  snare.  I 
knew  but  one  object — saw  but  one  heavenly  vision.  Oh !  mine 
— mine  at  least  in  that  vision — are  you  indeed  lost  to  me  for 
ever?" 

There  was  that  in  this  man's  tone  and  manner  which,  wheth- 
er arising  from  accomplished  hypocrisy,  or  actual,  if  perverted, 
feeling,  would,  I  thought,  find  its  way  at  once  to  the  heart  of  a 
woman  who,  however  wrronged,  had  once  loved  him ;  and,  with 
a  cold  misgiving,  I  fixed  my  eyes  on  Miss  Trevanion.  Her 
look,  as  she  turned  with  a  visible  tremor,  suddenly  met  mine, 
and  I  believe  that  she  discerned  my  doubt,  for  after  suffering 
her  eyes  to  rest  on  my  own,  Avith  something  of  mournful  re- 
proach, her  lips  curved  as  with  the  pride  of  her  mother,  and 
for  the  first  time  in  my  life  I  saw  anger  on  her  brow. 

"  It  is  well,  sir,  that  you  have  thus  spoken  to  me  in  the  pres- 
ence of  others,  for  in  their  presence  I  call  upon  you  to  say,  by 
that  honour  which  the  son  of  this  gentleman  may  for  a  while 
forget,  but  cannot  wholly  forfeit,  —  I  call  upon  you  to  say, 
whether  by  deed,  word,  or  sign,  I,  Frances  Trevanion,  ever 
gave  you  cause  to  believe  that  I  returned  the  feeling  you  say 
you  entertained  for  me,  or  encouraged  you  to  dare  this  at- 
tempt to  place  me  in  your  power." 

"  No  !"  cried  Vivian,  readily,  but  with  a  writhing  lip — "  no ; 
but  where  I  loved  so  deeply,  perilled  all  my  fortune  for  one 
fair  occasion  to  tell  you  so  alone,  I  would  not  think  that  such 
love  could  meet  only  loathing  and  disdain.  What  ! — has  na- 
ture shaped  me  so  unkindly,  that  where  I  love  no  love  can  re- 
ply? What !  has  the  accident  of  birth  shut  me  out  from  the 
right  to  wroo  and  mate  with  the  highborn  ?  For  the  last,  at 
least  that  gentleman  injustice  should  tell  you,  since  it  has  been 
his  care  to  instil  the  haughty  lesson  into  me,  that  my  lineage  is 
one  that  befits  lofty  hopes,  and  wan-ants  fearless  ambition. 
My  hopes,  my  ambition — they  were  you!  Oh,  Miss  Trevan- 
ion, it  is  true  that  to  win  you  I  would  have  braved  the  world's 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  387 

laws,  defied  every  foe,  save  him  who  now  rises  before  me.  Yet, 
believe  me,  believe  me,  had  I  won  what  I  dared  to  aspire  to, 
you  would  not  have  been  disgraced  by  your  choice ;  and  the 
name,  for  which  I  thank  not  my  father,  should  not  have  been 
despised  by  the  woman  who  pardoned  my  presumption,  nor 
by  the  man  who  now  tramples  on  my  anguish  and  curses  me 
in  my  desolation." 

Not  by  a  word  had  Roland  sought  to  interrupt  his  son — 
nay,  by  a  feverish  excitement,  which  my  heart  understood  in 
its  secret  sympathy,  he  had  seemed  eagerly  to  court  every  syl- 
lable that  could  extenuate  the  darkness  of  the  offence,  or  even 
imply  some  less  sordid  motive  for  the  baseness  of  the  means. 
But  as  the  son  now  closed  with  the  words  of  unjust  reproach, 
and  the  accents  of  fierce  despair — closed  a  defence  that  show- 
ed, in  its  false  pride  and  its  perverted  eloquence,  so  utter  a 
blindness  to  every  principle  of  that  Honour  which  had  been 
the  father's  idol,  Roland  placed  his  hand  before  the  eyes  that 
he  had  previously,  as  if  spellbound,  fixed  on  the  hardened  of- 
fender, and  once  more  drawing  Fanny  towards  him,  said — 

"  His  breath  pollutes  the  air  that  innocence  and  honesty 
should  breathe.  He  says  'All  in  this  house  are  at  his  com- 
mand,'— why  do  we  stay  ? — let  us  go."  He  turned  towards 
the  door,  and  Fanny  with  him. 

Meanwhile  the  louder  sounds  below  had  been  silenced  for 
some  moments,  but  I  heard  a  step  in  the  hall.  Vivian  started, 
and  placed  himself  before  us. 

"  Xo,  no,  you  cannot  leave  me  thus,  Miss  Trevanion.  I  re- 
sign you — be  it  so;  I  do  not  even  ask  for  pardon.  But  to 
leave  this  house  thus,  without  carriage,  without  attendants, 
without  explanation ! — the  blame  falls  on  me — it  shall  do  so. 
But  at  least  vouchsafe  me  the  right  to  repair  what  I  yet  can 
repair  of  the  wrong,  to  protect  all  that  is  left  to  me  —  your 
name." 

As  he  spoke,  he  did  not  perceive  (for  he  was  facing  us,  with 
his  back  to  the  door)  that  a  new  actor  had  noiselessly  entered 
on  the  scene,  and,  pausing  by  the  threshold,  heard  his  last 
words. 

"  The  name  of  Miss  Trevanion,  sir — and  from  what  ?"  asked 
the  new  comer,  as  he  advanced  and  surveyed  Vivian  with  a 
look  that,  but  for  its  quiet,  would  have  seemed  disdain. 

"  Lord  Castleton !"  exclaimed  Fanny,  lifting  up  the  face  she 
had  buried  in  her  hands. 


THE   CAXTON8  : 

Vivian  recoiled  in  dismay,  and  gnashed  his  teeth. 

"Sir,"  said  the  marquis, MI  await  your  reply;  for  not  even 
yon,  in  my  presence,  shall  imply  that  one  reproach  can  he  at- 
tached to  the  name  of  that  lady." 

"  ( )]i,  moderate  your  tone  to  me,  my  Lord  Castleton !"  cried 
Vivian:  "in  you  at  least  there  is  one  man  I  am  not  forbidden 
to  brave  and  defy.  It  was  to  save  that  lady  from  the  cold  am- 
bition of  her  parents — it  was  to  prevent  the  sacrifice  of  her 
youth  and  beauty  to  one  whose  sole  merits  are  his  wealth  and 
his  titles  —  it  was  this  that  impelled  me  to  the  crime  I  have 
committed,  this  that  hurried  me  on  to  risk  all  for  one  hour, 
when  youth  at  least  could  plead  its  cause  to  youth;  and  this 
gives  me  now  the  power  to  say  that  it  does  rest  with  me  to 
protect  the  name  of  the  lady,  whom  your  very  servility  to  that 
world  which  you  have  made  your  idol  forbids  you  to  claim  from 
the  heartless  ambition  that  would  sacrifice  the  daughter  to  the 
vanity  of  the  parents.  Ha!  the  future  Marchioness  of  Castle- 
ton on  her  way  to  Scotland  with  a  penniless  adventurer  !  Ha ! 
if  my  lips  are  sealed,  who  but  I  can  seal  the  lips  of  those  be- 
low in  my  secret  ?  The  secret  shall  be  kept,  but  on  this  con- 
dition— you  shall  not  triumph  where  I  have  failed ;  I  may  lose 
what  I  adored,  but  I  do  not  resign  it  to  another.  Ha !  have  I 
foiled  you,  my  Lord  Castleton  ? — ha,  ha !" 

"  No,  sir  ;  and  I  almost  forgive  you  the  villany  you  have  not 
effected,  for  informing  me,  for  the  first  time,  that,  had  I  pre- 
sumed to  address  Miss  Trevanion,  her  parents  at  least  would 
have  pardoned  the  presumption.  Trouble  not  yourself  as  to 
what  your  accomplices  may  say.  They  have  already  confess- 
ed their  infamy  and  your  own.     Out  of  my  path,  sir !" 

Then,  with  the  benign  look  of  a  father,  and  the  lofty  grace 
of  a  prince,  Lord  Castleton  advanced  to  Fanny.  Looking  round 
with  a  shudder,  she  hastily  placed  her  hand  in  his,  and,  by  so 
doing,  perhaps  prevented  some  violence  on  the  part  of  Vivian, 
whose  heaving  breast,  and  eye  bloodshot,  and  still  unquailing, 
showed  how  little  even  shame  had  subdued  his  fiercer  passions. 
Bnt  lie  made  no  offer  1<>  detain  them,  and  his  tongue  seemed 
to  cleave  to  his  lips.  Now,  as  Fanny  moved  to  the  door,  she 
passed  Roland,  who  stood  motionless  and  with  vacant  looks, 
like  an  image  of  stone;  and  with  a  beautiful  tenderness,  for 
which  (even  al  tliis  distanl  date, recalling  it)  I  say, "  God  re- 
quite thee,  Fanny,"  she  laid  her  other  hand  on  Roland's  arm, 
and  said,  "  ( lome  (<><» :  your  arm  still !" 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  389 

But  Roland's  limbs  trembled  and  refused  to  stir ;  his  head, 
relaxing,  drooped  on  his  breast,  his  eyes  closed.  Even  Lord 
Castleton  was  so  struck  (though  unable  to  guess  the  true  and 
terrible  cause  of  his  dejection),  that  he  forgot  his  desire  to 
hasten  from  the  spot,  and  cried  with  all  his  kindliness  of  heart, 
"  You  are  ill — you  faint ;  give  him  your  arm,  Pisistratus." 

"  It  is  nothing,"  said  Roland,  feebly,  as  he  leant  heavily  on 
my  arm,  while  I  turned  back  my  head  with  all  the  bitterness 
of  that  reproach  which  filled  my  heart,  speaking  in  the  eyes 
that  sought  him,  whose  place  should  have  been  where  mine 
now  was.  And,  oh ! — thank  heaven,  thank  heaven ! — the  look 
was  not  in  vain.  In  the  same  moment  the  son  was  at  the  fa- 
ther's knees. 

"  Oh,  pardon — pardon !  "Wretch,  lost  wretch  though  I  be, 
I  bow  my  head  to  the  curse.  Let  it  fall — but  on  me,  and  on 
me  only — not  on  your  own  heart  too." 

Fanny  burst  into  tears,  sobbing  out,  "  Forgive  him,  as  I  do." 

Roland  did  not  heed  her. 

"  He  thinks  that  the  heart  was  not  shattered  before  the  curse 
could  come,"  he  said,  in  a  voice  so  weak  as  to  be  scarcely  audi- 
ble. Then,  raising  his  eyes  to  heaven,  his  lips  moved  as  if  he 
prayed  inly.  Pausing,  he  stretched  his  hands  over  his  son's 
head,  and,  averting  his  face,  said,  "  I  revoke  the  curse.  Pray 
to  thy  God  for  pardon." 

Perhaps  not  daring  to  trust  himself  further,  he  then  made  a 
violent  effort,  and  hurried  from  the  room. 

We  followed  silently.  When  we  gained  the  end  of  the  pas- 
sage, the  door  of  the  room  we  had  left  closed  with  a  sullen  jar. 

As  the  sound  smote  on  my  ear,  with  it  came  so  terrible  a 
sense  of  the  solitude  upon  which  that  door  had  closed — so  keen 
and  quick  an  apprehension  of  some  fearful  impulse,  suggested 
by  passions  so  fierce,  to  a  condition  so  forlorn — that  instinctive- 
ly I  stopped,  and  then  hurried  back  to  the  chamber.  The  lock 
of  the  door  having  been  previously  forced,  there  was  no  bar- 
rier to  oppose  my  entrance.  I  advanced,  and  beheld  a  specta- 
cle of  such  agony  as  can  only  be  conceived  by  those  who  have 
looked  on  the  grief  which  takes  no  fortitude  from  reason,  no 
consolation  from  conscience  —  the  grief  which  tells  us  what 
Would  be  the  earth  were  man  abandoned  to  his  passions,  and 
the  chance  of  the  atheist  reigned  alone  in  the  merciless  heavens. 
Pride  humbled  to  the  dust ;  ambition  shivered  into  fragments; 


300  i  in-:   CAXTONS: 

love  (or  the  passion  mistaken  for  it)  blasted  into  ashes;  life, 
at  the  first  onset, bereaved  of  its  holiest  ties, forsaken  by  its 
truest  guide!  shame  thai  writhed  for  revenge,  and  remorse  thai 
knew  not  prayer — all,  all  blended,  yet  distinct,  were  in  that 
awful  spectacle  of  the  guilty  son. 

And  I  had  told  but  twenty  years,  and  my  heart  had  been 
mellowed  in  the  tender  sunshine  of  a  happy  home,  and  I  had 
loved  this  boy  as  a  stranger,  and  lo!  he  was  Roland's  son!  I 
forgot  all  else,  looking  upon  that  anguish  ;  and  I  threw  myself 
011  the  ground  by  the  form  that  writhed  there,  and,  folding  my 
arms  round  the  breast  which  in  vain  repelled  me,  I  whispered, 
"  Comfort — comfort — life  is  long.  You  shall  redeem  the  past, 
you  shall  efface  the  stain,  and  your  father  shall  bless  you  yet !" 


CHAPTER  II. 

I  could  not  stay  long  with  my  unhappy  cousin,  but  still  I 
stayed  long  enough  to  make  me  think  it  probable  that  Lord 
Castleton's  carriage  would  have  left  the  inn:  and  when,  as  I 
passed  the  hall,  I  saw  it  standing  before  the  open  door,  I  was 
seized  with  fear  for  Roland  ;  his  emotions  might  have  ended  in 
some  physical  attack.  Nor  were  those  fears  without  founda- 
tion. I  found  Fanny  kneeling  beside  the  old  soldier  in  the 
parlour  where  we  had  seen  the  two  women,  and  bathing  his 
arm;  and  the  Marquess's  favourite  valet,  who,  amongst  his 
other  gifts,  was  something  of  a  surgeon,  was  wiping  the  blade 
of  the  pen-knife  that  had  served  instead  of  a  lancet.  Lord 
( Jastleton  nodded  to  me,  "  Don't  be  uneasy — a  little  fainting  fit 
— we  have  bled  him.     He  is  safe  now — see,  he  is  recovering." 

Roland's  eyes,  as  they  opened,  turned  to  me  with  an  anxious 
inquiring  look.  I  smiled  upon  him  as  I  kissed  his  forehead, 
and  could,  with  a  safe  conscience,  whisper  words  which  neither 
lather  nor  Christian  could  refuse  to  receive  :is  comfort. 

In  a  few  minutes  more  we  had  left  the  house.  As  Lord 
Castleton's  carriage  only  held  two,  the  Marquess,  having  as- 
sisted  Miss  Trevanion  and  Roland  to  enter,  quietly  mounted 
the  scat  behind,  and  made  a  sign  to  me  to  come  by  his  side, 
for  there  was  room  for  both.  (Ilis  servant  had  taken  one  of 
the  horses  that  had  brought  thither  Roland  and  myself,  and 
already  gone  on  before.)     No  conversation  took  place  between 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  391 

us  then.  Lord  Castleton  seemed  profoundly  affected,  and  I 
had  no  words  at  my  command. 

When  we  reached  the  inn  at  which  Lord  Castleton  had 
changed  horses,  about  six  miles  distant,  the  Marquess  insisted 
on  Fanny's  taking  some  rest  for  a  few  hours,  for  indeed  she 
was  thoroughly  worn  out. 

I  attended  my  uncle  to  his  room,  but  he  only  answered  my 
assurances  of  his  son's  repentance  with  a  pressure  of  the  hand, 
and  then,  gliding  from  me,  went  into  the  farthest  recess  of  the 
room,  and  there  knelt  down.  When  he  rose,  he  was  passive 
and  tractable  as  a  child.  He  suffered  me  to  assist  him  to  un- 
dress ;  and  when  he  had  lain  down  on  the  bed,  he  turned  his 
face  quietly  from  the  light,  and,  after  a  few  heavy  sighs,  sleep 
seemed  mercifully  to  steal  upon  him.  I  listened  to  his  heavy 
breathing  till  it  grew  low  and  regular,  and  then  descended  to 
the  sitting-room  in  which  I  had  left  Lord  Castleton,  for  he  had 
asked  me  in  a  whisper  to  seek  him  there. 

I  found  the  Marquess  seated  by  the  fire,  in  a  thoughtful  and 
dejected  attitude. 

"  I  am  glad  you  are  come,"  said  he,  making  room  for  me  on 
the  hearth,  "  for  I  assure  you  I  have  not  felt  so  mournful  for 
many  years ;  we  have  much  to  explain  to  each  other.  Will 
you  begin :  they  say  the  sound  of  the  bell  dissipates  the  thun- 
der-cloud. And  there  is  nothing  like  the  voice  of  a  frank  hon- 
est nature  to  dispel  all  the  clouds  that  come  upon  us  when  we 
think  of  our  own  faults  and  the  villany  of  others.  But  I  beg 
you  a  thousand  pardons — that  young  man  your  relation ! — 
your  brave  uncle's  son !     Is  it  possible  ?" 

My  explanations  to  Lord  Castleton  were  necessarily  brief 
and  imperfect.  The  separation  between  Roland  and  his  son, 
my  ignorance  of  its  cause,  my  belief  in  the  death  of  the  latter, 
my  chance  acquaintance  with  the  supposed  Vivian ;  the  inter- 
est I  took  in  him ;  the  relief  it  was  to  the  fears  for  his  fate 
with  which  he  inspired  me,  to  think  he  had  returned  to  the 
home  I  ascribed  to  him ;  and  the  circumstances  which  had  in- 
duced my  suspicions,  justified  by  the  result — all  this  was  soon 
hurried  over. 

"  But,  I  beg  your  pardon,"  said  the  Marquess,  interrupting 
me,  "  did  you,  in  your  friendship  for  one  so  unlike  you,  even 
by  your  own  partial  account,  never  suspect  that  you  had  stum- 
bled upon  your  lost  cousin  ?" 


mi:  CAXT0N8  : 

"Such  :iu  idea  never  could  have  crossed  me." 

And  here  I  must  observe,  thai  though  the  reader,  a1  the 
first  introduction  of  Vivian,  would  divine  the  secret — the  pen- 
etration of  a  reader  is  wholly  different  from  that  of  the  actor 
in  events.  That  1  had  chanced  on  one  oftlio.se  curious  coin- 
cidences in  the  romance  of  real  life,  which  a  reader  looks  out 
for  and  expects  in  following  the  eourse  of  narrative,  was  a  sup- 
position forbidden  to  me  by  a  variety  of  causes.  There  was 
not  the  least  family  resemblance  between  Vivian  and  any  of 
his  relations;  and,  somehow  or  other,  in  Roland's  son  I  had 
pictured  to  myself  a  form  and  a  character  wholly  different  from 
Vivian's.  To  me  it  would  have  seemed  impossible  that  my 
cousin  could  have  been  so  little  curious  to  hear  any  of  our  joint 
family  affairs ;  been  so  unheedful,  or  even  weary,  if  I  spoke  of 
Roland — never,  by  a  word  or  tone,  have  betrayed  a  sympathy 
with  his  kindred.  And  my  other  conjecture  was  so  probable ! 
— son  of  the  Colonel  Vivian  whose  name  he  bore.  And  that 
letter,  with  the  post-mark  of"  Godalming !"  and  myT  belief,  too, 
in  my  cousin's  death;  even  now  I  am  not  surprised  that  the 
idea  never  occurred  to  me. 

I  paused  from  enumerating  these  excuses  for  my  dulness, 
angry  with  myself,  for  I  noticed  that  Lord  Castleton's  fair 
brow  darkened; — and  he  exclaimed,  "What  deceit  he  must 
have  gone  through  before  he  could  become  such  a  master  in 
the  art !" 

"  That  is  true,  and  T  cannot  deny  it,"  said  I.  "  But  his  pun- 
ishment now  is  awful :  let  us  hope  that  repentance  may  follow 
the  chastisement.  And,  though  certainly  it  must  have  been 
his  own  fault  that  drove  him  from  his  father's  home  and  guid- 
ance, yet,  so  driven,  let  us  make  some  allowance  for  the  influ- 
ence of  evil  companionship  on  one  so  young — for  the  suspicions 
that  the  knowledge  of  evil  produces,  and  turns  into  a  kind  of 
false  knowledge  of  the  world.  And  in  this  last  and  worst  of 
all  his  actions" — 

"Ah,  how  justify  that?" 

"Justify  it! — good  heavens!  justify  it! — no.  I  only  say 
this,  strange  as  it.  may  seem,  that  I  believe  his  affection  for 
Miss  Trevanion  was  for  herself:  so  he  says, from  the  depth  of 
an  anguish  in  which  the  most  insincere  of  men  would  cease  to 
feign.      But  no  more  of  this — she  is  saved,  thank  Heaven!" 

"And  you  believe,"  said  Lord  Castleton,  musingly,  "  that 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  393 

he  spoke  the  truth  when  he  thought  that  I" —  The  Marquess 
stopped,  coloured  slightly,  and  then  went  on.  "  But  no ; 
Lady  Ellinor  and  Trevanion,  whatever  might  have  been  in 
their  thoughts,  would  never  have  so  forgot  their  dignity  as  to 
take  him,  a  youth — almost  a  stranger — nay,  take  any  one  into 
their  confidence  on  such  a  subject." 

"It  was  but  by  broken  gasps,  incoherent,  disconnected 
words,  that  Vivian — I  mean  my  cousin — gave  me  any  explana- 
tion of  this.  But  Lady  X ,  at  whose  house  he  was  stay- 
ing, appears  to  have  entertained  such  a  notion,  or  at  least  led 
my  cousin  to  think  so." 

"  All !  that  is  possible,"  said  Lord  Castleton,  with  a  look  of 

relief.     "  Lady  X and  I  were  boy  and  girl  together ;  we 

correspond;  she  has  written  to  me  suggesting  that — Ah!  I 
see — an  indiscreet  woman.  Hum !  this  comes  of  lady  corre- 
spondents !" 

Lord  Castleton  had  recourse  to  the  Beaudesert  mixture; 
and  then,  as  if  eager  to  change  the  subject,  began  his  own  ex- 
planation. On  receiving  my  letter,  he  saw  even  more  cause  to 
suspect  a  snare  than  I  had  done,  for  he  had  that  morning  re- 
ceived a  letter  from  Trevanion,  not  mentioning  a  word  about 
his  illness;  and  on  turning  to  the  newspaper,  and  seeing  a 
paragraph  headed,  "  Sudden  and  alarming  illness  of  Mr.  Tre- 
vanion," the  Marquess  had  suspected  some  party  manoeuvre 
or  unfeeling  hoax,  since  the  mail  that  had  brought  the  letter 
must  have  travelled  as  quickly  as  any  messenger  who  had 
given  the  information  to  the  newspaper.  He  had,  however, 
immediately  sent  down  to  the  office  of  the  journal  to  inquire 
on  what  authority  the  paragraph  had  been  inserted,  while  he 
despatched  another  messenger  to  St.  James's  Square.  The 
reply  from  the  ofiice  was,  that  the  message  had  been  brought 
by  a  servant  in  Mr.  Trevanion's  livery,  but  was  not  admitted 
as  news  until  it  had  been  ascertained  by  inquiries  at  the 
minister's  house  that  Lady  Ellinor  had  received  the  same  in- 
telligence, and  actually  left  town  in  consequence. 

"  I  was  extremely  sorry  for  poor  Lady  Ellinor's  uneasiness," 
said  Lord  Castleton,  "  and  extremely  puzzled,  but  I  still  thought 
there  could  be  no  real  ground  for  alarm  until  your  letter  reach- 
ed me.  And  when  you  there  stated  your  conviction  that  Mr. 
Gower  was  mixed  up  in  this  fable,  and  that  it  concealed  some 
snare  upon  Fanny,  I  saw  the  thing  at  a  glance.     The  road  to 

R  2 


i  in:  (A.\  tons  : 

Lord  N V,  till  within  the  last  Btage  or  two,  would  be  the 

road  i"  Scotland.  And  a  hardy  and  unscrupulous  adventurer, 
with  the  assistance  of  Miss  Trevanion's  servants,  might  thus 
entrap  her  to  Scotland  itself,  and  there  work  on  her  fears;  or, 
if  he  had  hope  in  her  affections,  entrap  her  into  consent  to  a 
Scotch  marriage.  Sou  may  be  sure,  therefore,  that  I  was  on 
the  road  as  soon  as  possible.  But  as  your  messenger  came  all 
the  way  from  the  City,  and  not  so  quickly  perhaps  as  he  might 
have  come ;  and  then,  as  there  was  the  carriage  to  see  to,  and 
the  horses  to  send  for,  I  found  myself  more  than  an  hour  and 
a  half  behind  you.  Fortunately,  however,  I  made  good  ground, 
and  should  probably  have  overtaken  you  half-way,  but  that,  on 
passing  between  a  ditch  and  a  wagon,  the  carriage  was  iipset, 
and  that  somewhat  delayed  me.      On  arriving  at  the  town 

where  the  road  branched  off  to  Lord  X 's,  I  was  rejoiced 

to  learn  you  had  taken  what  I  was  sure  would  prove  the  right 
direction,  and  finally  I  gained  the  clue  to  that  villanous  inn, 
by  the  report  of  the  post-boys  who  had  taken  Miss  Trevanion's 
carriage  there,  and  met  you  on  the  road.  On  reaching  the  inn, 
I  found  two  fellows  conferring  outside  the  door.  They  sprang 
in  as  we  drove  up,  but  not  before  my  servant  Summers — a 
quick  fellow,  you  know,  who  has  travelled  with  me  from  Nor- 
way to  Nubia — had  quitted  his  seat,  and  got  into  the  house, 
into  which  I  followed  him  with  a  step,  you  dog,  as  active  as 
your  own !  Egad  !  I  was  twenty-one  then !  Two  fellows  had 
already  knocked  down  poor  Summers,  and  showed  plenty  of 
fight.  Do  you  know,"  said  the  Marquess,  interrupting  him- 
self, with  an  air  of  serio-comic  humiliation — "do  you  know 
that  I  actually — no,  you  never  will  believe  it — mind,  'tis  a  se- 
cret— actually  broke  my  cane  over  one  fellow's  shoulders  ? — 
look !"  (and  the  Marquess  held  up  the  fragment  of  the  lament- 
ed weapon).  "And  I  half  suspect,  but  I  can't  say  positively, 
that  I  had  even  the  necessity  to  demean  myself  by  a  blow  with 
the  naked  hand — clenched  too! — quite  Eton  again — upon  my 
honour  it  was.     Ila,  ha!" 

And  the  Marquess — whose  magnificent  proportions,  in  the 
full  vigour  of  man's  strongest,  if  not  his  most  combative,  age, 
would  have  made  him  a  formidable  antagonist,  even  to  a  couple 
of  prize-fighters,  supposing  he  had  retained  a  little  of  Eton 
skill  in  such  encounters — laughed  with  the  glee  of  a  schoolboy, 
whether  at  the  thought  of  his  prowess,  or  his  sense  of  the  con- 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  395 


trast  between  so  rude  a  recourse  to  primitive  warfare,  and  his 
own  indolent  habits,  and  almost  feminine  good  temper.  Com- 
posing himself,  however,  with  the  quick  recollection  how  little 
I  could  share  his  hilarity,  he  resumed  gravely,  "It  took  us 
some  time — I  don't  say  to  defeat  our  foes ;  but  to  bind  them, 
which  I  thought  a  necessary  precaution ; — one  fellow,  Trevan- 
ion's servant,  all  the  while  stunning  me  with  quotations  from 
Shakespeare.  I  then  gently  laid  hold  of  a  gown,  the  bearer 
of  which  had  been  long  trying  to  scratch  me  ;  but  being  luck- 
ily a  small  woman,  had  not  succeeded  in  reaching  to  my  eyes. 
But  the  gown  escaped,  and  fluttered  off  to  the  kitchen.  I  fol- 
lowed, and  there  I  found  Miss  Trevanion's  Jezebel  of  a  maid. 
She  was  terribly  frightened,  and  affected  to  be  extremely  peni- 
tent. I  own  to  you  that  I  don't  care  what  a  man  says  in  the 
way  of  slander,  but  a  woman's  tongue  against  another  woman 
— especially  if  that  tongue  be  in  the  mouth  of  a  lady's  lady — I 
think  it  always  worth  silencing ;  I  therefore  consented  to  par- 
don this  woman  on  condition  she  would  find  her  way  here  be- 
fore morning.  No  scandal  shall  come  from  her.  Thus  you 
see  some  minutes  elapsed  before  I  joined  you ;  but  I  minded 
that  the  less,  as  I  heard  you  and  the  Captain  were  already  in 
the  room  with  Miss  Trevanion ;  and  not,  alas !  dreaming  of 
your  connection  with  the  culprit,  I  was  wondering  what  could 
have  delayed  you  so  long — afraid,  I  own  it,  to  find  that  Miss 
Trevanion's  heart  might  have  been  seduced  by  that — hem — 
hem! — handsome — young — hem — hem! — There's  no  fear  of 
that  ?"  added  Lord  Castleton,  anxiously,  as  he  bent  his  bright 
eyes  upon  mine. 

I  felt  myself  colour  as  I  answered  firmly,  "  It  is  just  to  Miss 
Trevanion  to  add,  that  the  unhappy  man  owned,  in  her  pres- 
ence and  in  mine,  that  he  had  never  had  the  slightest  encour- 
agement for  his  attempt — never  one  cause  to  believe  that  she 
approved  the  affection  which,  I  try  to  think,  blinded  and  mad- 
dened himself." 

"  I  believe  you ;  for  I  think"—  Lord  Castleton  paused  un- 
easily, again  looked  at  me,  rose,  and  walked  about  the  room 
with  evident  agitation ;  then,  as  if  he  had  come  to  some  reso- 
lution, he  returned  to  the  hearth  and  stood  facing  me. 

"  My  dear  young  friend,"  said  he,  with  his  irresistible  kind- 
ly frankness,  "  this  is  an  occasion  that  excuses  all  things  be- 
tween us,  even  my  impertinence.     Your  conduct  from  first  to 


THE   <   \.\  ions: 

last  has  been  Buch,  that  I  wish,  from  the  bottom  of  my  heart, 
that  I  had  a  daughter  to  offer  you,  and  that  you  felt  for  her  as 
I  believe  you  feel  for  Miss  Trevanion.  These  are  not  mere 
words  ;  do  not  look  down  as  if  ashamed.     All  the  marquisates 

in  the  world  would  never  give  me  the  pride  I  should  feel,  if  I 
could  see  in  my  life  one  steady  self-sacrifice  to  duty  and  hon- 
our, equal  to  that  which  I  have  witnessed  in  you." 

"  Oh,  my  lord  !  my  lord  I" 

"  Hear  me  out.  That  you  love  Fanny  Trevanion  I  know ; 
that  she  may  have  innocently,  timidly,  half-unconsciously,  re- 
turned that  affection,  I  think  probable.     But — " 

"  I  know  what  you  would  say ;  spare  me — I  know  it  all." 

"  No !  it  is  a  thing  impossible ;  and,  if  Lady  Ellinor  could 
consent,  there  would  be  such  a  life-long  regret  on  her  part, 
such  a  weight  of  obligation  on  yours,  that — no,  I  repeat,  it  is 
impossible !  But  let  us  both  think  of  this  poor  girl.  I  know 
her  better  than  you  can — have  known  her  from  a  child ;  know 
all  her  virtues — they  are  charming ;  all  her  faults — they  expose 
her  to  danger.  These  parents  of  hers — with  their  genius  and 
ambition — may  do  very  Avell  to  rule  England,  and  influence 
the  world ;  but  to  guide  the  fate  of  that  child — no !"  Lord 
Castleton  stopped,  for  he  was  affected.  I  felt  my  old  jealousy 
return,  but  it  was  no  longer  bitter. 

"  I  say  nothing,"  continued  the  Marquess,  "  of  this  position, 
in  which,  without  fault  of  hers,  Miss  Trevanion  is  placed : 
Lady  Ellinor's  knowledge  of  the  world,  and  woman's  wit,  will 
see  how  all  that  can  be  best  put  right.  Still  it  is  awkward, 
and  demands  much  consideration.  But,  putting  this  aside  al- 
together, if  you  do  firmly  believe  that  Miss  Trevanion  is  lost 
to  you,  can  you  bear  to  think  that  she  is  to  be  flung  as  a  mere 
cipher  into  the  account  of  the  worldly  greatness  of  an  aspiring 
politician — married  to  some  minister,  too  busy  to  watch  over 
her ;  or  some  duke,  who  looks  to  pay  off  his  mortgages  with 
her  fortune — minister  or  duke  only  regarded  as  a  prop  to  Tre- 
vanion's  power  against  a  counter  cabal,  or  as  giving  his  section 
a  preponderance  in  the  cabinet?  Be  assured  such  is  her  most 
likely  destiny,  or  rather  the  beginning  of  a  destiny  yet  more 
mournful.  Now,  I  tell  you  this,  that  he  who  marries  Fanny 
Trevanion  should  have  little  other  object,  for  the  first  few 
years  of  marriage,  than  to  correct  her  failings  and  develop  her 
virtues.     Believe  one   who,  alas!  has  too   dearly  bought  his 


A    FAMILY    PICTUKE.  397 

knowledge  of  woman — hers  is  a  character  to  be  formed.  Well, 
then,  if  this  prize  be  lost  to  you,  would  it  be  an  irreparable 
grief  to  your  generous  affection  to  think  that 'it  has  fallen  to 
the  lot  of  one  who  at  least  knows  his  responsibilities,  and  who 
will  redeem  his  own  life,  hitherto  wasted,  by  the  steadfast  en- 
deavour to  fulfil  them  ?  Can  you  take  this  hand  still,  and  press 
it,  even  though  it  be  a  rival's  ?" 

"  My  lord !     This  from  you  to  me,  is  an  honour  that — " 
"  You  will  not  take  my  hand  ?     Then,  believe  me,  it  is  not 
I  that  will  give  that  grief  to  your  heart." 

Touched,  penetrated,  melted,  by  this  generosity  in  a  man 
of  such  lofty  claims,  to  one  of  my  age  and  fortune,  I  pressed 
that  noble  hand,  half  raising  it  to  my  lips — an  action  of  respect 
that  would  have  misbecome  neither  ;  but  he  gently  withdrew 
the  hand,  in  the  instinct  of  his  natural  modesty.  I  had  then 
no  heart  to  speak  further  on  such  a  subject,  but  faltering  out 
that  I  would  go  and  see  my  uncle,  I  took  up  the  light,  and 
ascended  the  stairs.  I  crept  noiselessly  into  Roland's  room, 
and  shading  the  light,  saw  that,  though  he  slept,  his  face  was 
very  troubled.  And  then  I  thought,  "  What  are  my  young 
griefs  to  his  ?"  and  sitting  beside  the  bed,  communed  with  my 
own  heart  and  was  still ! 


CHAPTER  III. 

At  sunrise  I  went  down  into  the  sitting-room,  having  re- 
solved to  write  to  my  father  to  join  us ;  for  I  felt  how  much 
Roland  needed  his  comfort  and  his  counsel,  and  it  was  no  great 
distance  from  the  old  Tower.  I  was  surprised  to  find  Lord 
Castleton  still  seated  by  the  fire ;  he  had  evidently  not  gone 
to  bed. 

"That's  right,"  said  he;  "we  must  encourage  each  other 
to  recruit  nature,"  and  he  pointed  to  the  breakfast  things  on 
the  table. 

I  had  scarcely  tasted  food  for  many  hours,  but  I  was  only 
aware  of  my  own  hunger  by  a  sensation  of  faintness.  I  ate 
unconsciously,  and  was  almost  ashamed  to  feel  how  much  the 
food  restored  me. 

"  I  suppose,"  said  I,  "  that  you  will  soon  set  off  to  Lord 
N 's  ?" 


,398  THE  CAXTONS  : 

M  Nay,  did  r  not  tell  you  thai  I  have  sent  Summers  express, 
with  a  note  t<>  Lady  Ellinor,  begging  her  i<>  come  here?  I 
<li<l  not  see,  mi  reflection,  how  1  could  decorously  accompany 
Miss  Trevanion  alone,  withoul  even  a  female  servant,  to  a 
house  lull  of  gossiping  guests.  And  even  had  your  uncle  been 
well  enough  to  go  with  us,  his  presence  would  but  have  cre- 
ated  an  additional  cause  for  wonder;  so,  as  soon  as  we  arrived, 
and  while  you  went  up  with  the  Captain,  I  wrote  my  letter 
and  despatched  my  man.  I  expect  Lady  Ellinor  will  be  here 
before  nine  o'clock.  Meanwhile,  I  have  already  seen  that  in- 
famous waiting-woman,  and  taken  care  to  prevent  any  danger 
from  her  garrulity.  And  you  will  be  pleased  to  hear  that  I 
have  hit  upon  a  mode  of  satisfying  the  curiosity  of  our  friend 
Mrs.  Grundy — that  is, '  the  World' — without  injury  to  any  one. 
We  must  suppose  that  that  footman  of  Trevanion's  was  out 
of  his  mind — it  is  but  a  charitable,  and  your  good  father  would 
say,  a  philosophical  supposition.  All  great  knavery  is  mad- 
ness !  The  world  could  not  get  on  if  truth  and  goodness  were 
not  the  natural  tendencies  of  sane  minds.  Do  you  under- 
stand?" 

"  Xot  quite." 

"  Why,  the  footman,  being  out  of  his  mind,  invented  this 
mad  story  of  Trevanion's  illness,  frightened  Lady  Ellinor  and 
Miss  Trevanion  out  of  their  wits  with  his  own  chimera,  and 
hurried  them  both  off,  one  after  the  other.  I  having  heard 
from  Trevanion,  and  knowing  he  could  not  have  been  ill  when 
the  servant  left  him,  set  off,  as  was  natural  in  so  old  a  friend 
of  the  family,  saved  her  from  the  freaks  of  a  maniac,  who,  get- 
ting more  and  more  flighty,  was  beginning  to  play  the  Jack 
o'  Lantern,  and  leading  her,  Heaven  knows  where,  over  the 
counl  py  ; — and  then  wrote  to  Lady  Ellinor  to  come  to  her.  It 
i-  l.ut  a  hearty  laugh  at  our  expense,  and  Mrs.  Grundy  is  con- 
tent. [fyOu  don't  want  herto  pity,  or  backbite,  let  her  laugh. 
She  is  a  she  Cerberus — she  wants  to  eat  you;  well — stop  her 
mouth  with  a  cake. 

uYl>s"  continued  this  better  sort  of  Aristippus,  so  wise  un- 
der all  his  seeming  levities;  "the  cue  thus  given,  everything 
favours  it.  If  thai  rogue  of  a  lackey  quoted  Shakespeare  as 
much  in  the  servants'  hall  as  he  did  while  I  was  binding  him 
neck  and  heels  in  the  kitchen,  that's  enough  for  all  the  house- 
hold i<>  declare  he  was  moon-stricken  ;  and  if  we  find  it  neces- 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  399 

sary  to  do  anything  more,  why,  we  must  induce  him  to  go 
into  Bedlam  for  a  month  or  two.  The  disappearance  of  the 
waiting-woman  is  natural ;  either  I  or  Lady  Ellin  or  send  her 
about  her  business  for  her  folly  in  being  so  gulled  by  the  luna- 
tic. If  that's  unjust,  why,  injustice  to  servants  is  common 
enough — public  and  private.  Neither  minister  nor  lackey  can 
be  forgiven,  if  he  help  us  into  a  scrape.  One  must  vent  one's 
passion  on  something.  Witness  my  poor  cane :  though,  in- 
deed, a  better  illustration  would  be  the  cane  that  Louis  XIV. 
broke  on  a  footman,  because  his  majesty  was  out  of  humour 
with  the  prince,  whose  shoulders;  were  too  sacred  for  royal  in- 
dignation. 

"  So  you  see,"  concluded  Lord  Castleton,  lowering  his  voice, 
"that  your  uncle,  amongst  all  his  other  causes  ol  sorrow,  may 
think  at  least  that  his  name  is  spared  in  his  son's.  And  the 
young  man  himself  may  find  reform  easier,  when  freed  from 
that  despair  of  the  possibility  of  redemption,  which  Mrs.  Grun- 
dy inflicts  upon  those  who — Courage,  then ;  life  is  long !" 

"  My  very  words !"  I  cried  ;  "  and  so  repeated  by  you,  Lord 
Castleton,  they  seem  prophetic." 

"  Take  my  advice,  and  don't  lose  sight  of  your  cousin,  while 
his  pride  is  yet  humbled,  and  "his  heart  perhaps  softened.  I 
don't  say  this  only  for  his  sake.  No,  it  is  your  poor  uncle  I 
think  of:  noble  old  fellow  !  And  now,  I  think  it  right  to  pay 
Lady  Ellinor  the  respect  of  repairing,  as  well  as  I  can,  the 
havoc  three  sleepless  nights  have  made  on  the  exterior  of  a 
gentleman  who  is  on  the  shady  side  of  remorseless  forty." 

Lord  Castleton  here  left  me,  and  I  wrote  to  my  father,  beg- 
ging him  to  meet  us  at  the  next  stage  (which  was  the  nearest 
point  from  the  high  road  to  the  Tower),  and  I  sent  off  the  let- 
ter by  a  messenger  on  horseback.  That  task  done,  I  leant  my 
head  upon  my  hand,  and  a  profound  sadness  settled  upon  me, 
despite  all  my  efforts  to  face  the  future,  and  think  only  of  the 
duties  of  life — not  its  sorrows. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

Before  nine  o'clock,  Lady  Ellinor  arrived,  and  went  straight 
into  Miss  Trevanion's  room.  I  took  refuge  in  my  uncle's.  Ro- 
land was  awake  and  calm,  but  so  feeble  that  he  made  no  effort 


1(10  CHE  <  A.XT0NS  : 

to  rise  :  and  it  was  his  calm,  indeed,  that  alarmed  me  the  most 
— it  was  like  the  calm  of  nature  thoroughly  exhausted.  Be 
obeyed  me  mechanically,  as  a  patienl  takes  from  your  hand 
the  draught  of  which  he  is  almost  unconscious,  when  I  pressed 
him  to  take  food.  He  smiled  on  me  faintly  when  I  spoke  to 
him,  but  made  me  a  sign  that  seemed  to  implore  silence.  Then 
lie  turned  his  i'aee  from  me,  and  buried  it  in  the  pillow;  and 
I  thought  that  lie  slept  again,  when,  raising  himself  a  little,  and 
feeling  for  my  hand,  be  said  in  a  scarcely  audible  voice, — 

-Where  is  be?" 

"  Would  you  see  him,  sir  ?" 

"  Xo,  no  ;  that  would  kill  me — and  then — what  would  be- 
come of  bim  ?" 

"He  has  promised  me  an  interview,  and  in  that  interview  I 
feel  assured  he  will  obey  your  wishes,  whatever  they  are." 

Roland  made  no  answer. 

"Lord  Castleton  has  arranged  all,  so  that  his  name  and 
madness  (thus  let  us  call  it)  will  never  be  known." 

"Pride,  pride!  pride  still!"  —  murmured  the  old  soldier. 
"  The  name,  the  name — well,  that  is  much  ;  but  the  living 
soul ! — I  wish  Austin  were  here." 

"  I  have  sent  for  him,  sir." 

Roland  pressed  my  hand,  and  was  again  silent.  Then  he  be- 
gan to  mutter,  as  I  thought,  incoherently,  about  the  Peninsula, 
and  obeying  orders;  and  how  some  officer  woke  Lord  Wel- 
lington at  night,  and  said  that  something  or  other  (I  could  not 
catch  what — the  phrase  was  technical  and  military)  was  im- 
possible; and  how  Lord  Wellington  asked  "Where's  the  or- 
der-book?" and  looking  into  the  order-book,  said,  "Not  at  all 
impossible,  for  it  is  in  the  order-book;"  and  so  Lord  Welling- 
ton turned  round  and  went  to  sleep  again.  Then  suddenly 
Roland  half  rose,  and  said  in  a  voice  clear  and  firm,  "But  Lord 
Wellington,  though  a  great  captain,  Avas  a  fallible  man,  sir,  and 
the  order-book  was  his  own  mortal  handiwork. — Get  me  the 
Bible!" 

Oh  Roland,  Poland!  and  I  had  feared  that  thy  mind  was 
wandering! 

So  T  went  down  and  borrowed  a  Bible,  in  large  characters, 
and  placed  it  on  the  bed  before  him,  opening  the  shutters,  and 
Letting  in  (iod's  day  upon  God's  word. 

I  had  just  done  this,  when  there  was  a  slight  knock  at  the 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  401 

door.  I  opened  it,  and  Lord  Castleton  stood  without.  He 
asked  me,  in  a  whisper,  if  he  might  see  my  uncle.  I  drew  him 
in  gently,  and  pointed  to  the  soldier  of  life,  "  learning  what 
was  not  impossible,"  from  the  unerring  Order-Book. 

Lord  Castleton  gazed  with  a  changing  countenance,  and, 
without  disturbing  my  uncle,  stole  back.  I  followed  him,  and 
gently  closed  the  door.  • 

"  You  must  save  his  son,"  he  said,  in  a  faltering  voice — 
"  you  must ;  and  tell  me  how  to  help  you.  That  sight ! — no 
sermon  ever  touched  me  more.  Now  come  down,  and  receive 
Lady  Ellinor's  thanks.  We  are  going.  She  wants  me  to  tell 
my  own  tale  to  my  old  friend,  Mrs.  Grundy:  so  I  go  with 
them.     Come !" 

On  entering  the  sitting-room,  Lady  Ellinor  came  up,  and 
fairly  embraced  me.  I  need  not  repeat  her  thanks,  still  less 
the  praises,  which  fell  cold  and  hollow  on  my  ear.  My  gaze 
rested  on  Fanny  where  she  stood  apart — her  eyes  heavy  with 
fresh  tears,  bent  on  the  ground.  And  the  sense  of  all  her 
charms — the  memory  of  the  tender,  exquisite  kindness  she  had 
shown  to  the  stricken  father !  the  generous  pardon  she  had  ex- 
tended to  the  criminal  son ;  the  looks  she  had  bent  upon  me 
on  that  memorable  night — looks  that  had  spoken  such  trust  in 
my  presence — the  moment  in  which  she  had  clung  to  me  for 
protection,  and  her  breath  been  warm  upon  my  cheek — all 
these  rushed  over  me ;  and  I  felt  that  the  struggle  of  months 
was  undone — that  I  had  never  loved  her  as  I  loved  her  then — 
when  I  saw  her  but  to  lose  her  evermore !  And  then  there 
came  for  the  first,  and,  I  now  rejoice  to  think,  for  the  only  time, 
a  bitter,  ungrateful  accusation  against  the  cruelty  of  fortune 
and  the  disparities  of  life.  What  was  it  that  set  our  two  hearts 
eternally  apart,  and  made  hope  impossible  ?  Not  nature,  but 
the  fortune  that  gives  a  second  nature  to  the  world.  Ah,  could 
I  then  think  that  it  is  in  that  second  nature  that  the  soul  is  or- 
dained to  seek  its  trials,  and  that  the  elements  of  human  vir- 
tue find  their  harmonious  place !  What  I  answered  I  know 
not.  Neither  know  I  how  long  I  stood  there  listening  to 
sounds  which  seemed  to  have  no  meaning,  till  there  came  other 
sounds  which  indeed  woke  my  sense,  and  made  my  blood  run 
cold  to  hear, — the  tramp  of  the  horses,  the  grating  of  the 
wheels,  the  voice  at  the  door  that  said,  "All  was  ready." 

Then  Fanny  lifted  her  eyes,  and  they  met  mine ;  and  then  in. 


402  THE   CAXTON8: 

voluntarily  and  hastily  she  moved  a  few  steps  towards  mo,  mid 
I  clasped  my  right  hand  to  my  heart,  as  it*  to  still  its  beating, 
and  remained  still.  Lord  Castleton  had  watched  us  both.  I 
felt  thai  watch  was  upon  us, though  I  had  till  then  shunned  his 
looks  :  now,  as  1  turned  my  eyes  from  Fanny's,  that  look  came 
full  upon  me — soft,  compassionate,  benignant.  Suddenly,  and 
with  an  unutterable  expression  of  nobleness,  the  Marquess 
turned  to  Lady  Ellinor,  and  said — "  Pardon  me  for  telling  you 
an  old  story.  A  friend  of  mine — a  man  of  my  own  years — had 
the  temerity  to  hope  that  he  might  one  day  or  other  win  the 
affections  of  a  lady  young  enough  to  be  his  daughter,  and 
whom  circumstances  and  his  own  heart  led  him  to  prefer  from 
all  her  sex.  My  friend  had  many  rivals  ;  and  you  will  not 
wonder — for  you  have  seen  the  lady.  Among  them  was  a 
young  gentleman,  who  for  months  had  been  an  inmate  of  the 
>ame  house — (Hush,  Lady  Ellinor  !  you  will  hear  me  out ;  the 
interest  of  my  story  is  to  come) — who  respected  the  sanctity 
of  the  house  he  had  entered,  and  had  left  it  when  he  felt  he 
loved,  for  he  was  poor  and  the  lady  rich.  Some  time  after, 
this  gentleman  saved  the  lady  from  a  great  danger,  and  was 
then  on  the  eve.  of  leaving  England — (Hush!  again  hush!) 
My  friend  was  present  when  these  two  young  persons  met,  be- 
fore the  probable  absence  of  many  years,  and  so  was  the  moth- 
er of  the  lady  to  whose  hand  he  still  hoped  one  day  to  aspire. 
lie  saw  that  his  young  rival  wished  to  say,  'Farewell!'  and 
without  a  Avitness  ;  that  farewell  was  all  that  his  honour  and 
his  reason  could  suffer  him  to  say.  My  friend  saw  that  the 
lady  felt  the  natural  gratitude  for  a  great  service,  and  the  nat- 
ural pity  for  a  generous  and  unfortunate  affection;  for  so,  Lady 
Ellinor,  he  only  interpreted  the  sob  that  reached  his  ear ! 
What  think  you  my  friend  did  ?  Your  high  mind  at  once 
conjectures.  He  said  to  himself — 'If  I  am  ever  to  be  blest 
with  the  heart  which,  in  spite  of  disparity  of  years,  I  yet  hope 
to  win,  let  me  show  how  entire  is  the  trust  that  I  place  in  its 
integrity  and  innocence:  let  the  romance  of  first  youth  be 
closed  —  the  farewell  of  pure  hearts  be  sj  token — unimbittered 
by  the  idle  jealousies  of  one  mean  suspicion.'  With  that 
thought,  which  you,  Lady  Ellinor,  will  never  stoop  to  blame, 
he  placed  his  hand  on  that  of  the  noble  mother,  drew  her  gen- 
tly towards  the  door,  and,  calmly  confident  of  the  result,  left 
these  two  young  natures  to  the  unwitnessed  impulse  of  maiden 
honour  and  manly  duty." 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  *  403 

All  this  was  said  and  done  with  a  grace  and  earnestness  that 
thrilled  the  listeners  :  word  and  action  suited  to  each  with  so 
inimitable  a  harmony  that  the  spell  was  not  broken  till  the 
voice  ceased  and  the  door  closed. 

That  mournful  bliss  for  which  I  had  so  pined  Avas  vouch- 
safed :  I  was  alone  with  her  to  whom,  indeed,  honour  and  rea- 
son forbade  me  to  say  more  than  the  last  farewell. 

It  was  some  time  before  we  recovered — before  we  felt  we 
were  alone. 

O,  ye  moments,  that  I  can  now  recall  with  so  little  sadness 
in  the  mellow  and  sweet  remembrance,  rest  ever  holy  and  un- 
disclosed in  the  solemn  recesses  of  the  heart.  Yes  ! — whatever 
confession  of  weakness  was  interchanged,  we  were  not  unwor- 
thy of  the  trust  that  permitted  the  mournful  consolation  of  the 
parting.  Xo  trite  love-tale — with  vows  not  to  be  fulfilled,  and 
hopes  that  the  future  must  belie — mocked  the  realities  of  the 
life  that  lay  before  us.  Yet  on  the  confines  of  the  dream  we 
saw  the  day  rising  cold  upon  the  world :  and  if — children  as 
we  well-nigh  were — we  shrunk  somewhat  from  the  light,  we 
did  not  blaspheme  the  sun.,  and  crv,  "  There  is  darkness  in  the 
dawn  !" 

All  that  we  attempted  was  to  comfort  and  strengthen  each 
other  for  that  which  must  be :  not  seeking  to  conceal  the  grief 
we  felt,  but  promising,  with  simple  faith,  to  struggle  against 
the  grief.  If  vow  were  pledged  between  us — that  was  the 
vow — each  for  the  other's  sake  would  strive  to  enjoy  the 
blessings  Heaven  left  us  still.  \Yell  may  I  say  that  we  were 
children  !  I  know  not,  in  the  broken  words  that  passed  be- 
tween us,  in  the  sorrowful  hearts  which  those  words  revealed 
— I  know  not  if  there  were  that  which  they  who  own,  in  hu- 
man passion,  but  the  storm  and  the  whirlwind,  would  call  the 
love  of  maturer  years — the  love  that  gives  fire  to  the  song,  and 
tragedy  to  the  stage  ;  but  I  know  that  there  was  neither  a 
word  nor  a  thought  which  made  the  sorrow  of  the  children  a 
rebellion  to  the  heavenly  Father. 

And  again  the  door  unclosed,  and  Fanny  walked  with  a  firm 
step  to  her  mother's  side,  and,  pausing  there,  extended  her 
hand  to  me,  and  said,  as  I  bent  over  it,  "Heaven  will  be  with 
you !" 

A  word  from  Lady  Ellinor  ;  a  frank  smile  from  him — the 
rival ;  one  last,  last  glance  from  the  soft  eyes  of  Fanny,  and 


In  I         •  i  in:  CAXTONS. 

then  Solitude  rushed  upon  me — rushed,  as  something  visible, 
palpable,  overpowering.     I  felt  it  in  the  glare  of  the  sunbeam 

— 1  heard  it  in  the  breath  of  the  air  !  like  a  ghost  it  rose  there 
— where  shi  had  filled  the  space  with  her  presence  but  a  mo- 
ment before.  A  something  seemed  gone  from  the  universe  for 
ever;  a  change  like  that  of  death  passed  through  my  being; 
and  when  I  woke  to  feel  that  my  being  lived  again,  I  knew 
that  it  was  my  youth  and  its  poet-land  that  were  no  more,  and 
that  I  had  passed,  with  an  unconscious  step,  which  never  could 
retrace  its  way,  into  the  hard  world  of  laborious  man ! 


PAET  SIXTEENTH. 
CHAPTER  I. 

"  Please,  sir,  be  this  note  for  you  ?"  asked  the  waiter. 

"  For  me — yes  ;  it  is  my  name." 

I  did  not  recognize  the  handwriting,  and  yet  the  note  was 
from  one  whose  writing  I  had  often  seen.  But  formerly  the 
writing  was  cramped,  stiff,  perpendicular  (a  feigned  hand, 
though  I  guessed  not  it  was  feigned) ;  now,  it  was  hasty,  ir- 
regular, impatient — scarce  a  letter  formed,  scarce  a  word  that 
seemed  finished — and  yet  strangely  legible  withal,  as  the  hand- 
writing of  a  bold  man  almost  always  is.  I  opened  the  note 
listlessly,  and  read — 

"  I  have  watched  for  you  all  the  morning.  I  saw  her  go. 
Well ! — I  did  not  throw  myself  under  the  hoofs  of  the  horses. 
I  write  this  in  a  public-house,  not  far.  Will  you  follow  the 
bearer,  and  see  once  again  the  outcast  whom  all  the  rest  of  the 
world  will  shun  ?" 

Though  I  did  not  recognize  the  hand,  there  could  be  no 
doubt  who  was  the  writer. 

"  The  boy  wants  to  know  if  there's  an  answer,"  said  the 
waiter. 

I  nodded,  took  up  my  hat,  and  left  the  room.  A  ragged  boy 
was  standing  in  the  yard,  and  scarcely  six  words  passed  be- 
tween us,  before  I  was  following  him  through  a  narrow  lane 
that  faced  the  inn,  and  terminated  in  a  turnstile.  Here  the 
boy  paused,  and  making  me  a  sign  to  go  on,  went  back  his 
way  whistling.  I  passed  the  turnstile,  and  found  myself  in  a 
green  field,  with  a  row  of  stunted  willows  hanging  over  a  nar- 
row rill.  I  looked  round  and  saw  Vivian  (as  I  intend  still  to 
call  him)  half  kneeling,  and  seemingly  intent  upon  some  object 
in  the  grass. 

My  eye  followed  his  mechanically.  A  young  unfledged  bird 
that  had  left  the  nest  too  soon,  stood,  all  still  and  alone,  on  the 
bare  short  sward — its  beak  open  as  for  food,  its  gaze  fixed  on 
us  with  a  wistful  staro,     Methought  there  was  something  in 


4  0G  i  in;  <  .\.\  roNs: 

the  forlorn  bird  thai  softened  me  more  1<>  the  forloner  youth, 
of  whom  it  seemed  a  type. 

-•Now."  said  Vivian,  speaking  half  to  himself,  half  to  me, 
"did  the  bird  fall  from  the  nest, or  leave  the  nest  fit  its  own 
wild  whim?  The  parenl  does  not  protect  it.  Mind,  I  say 
not  it  is  tlic  parent's  fault — perhaps  the  fault  is  all  with  the 
wanderer.  J  Jut,  look  you,  though  the  parent  is  not  here,  the 
\'vc  is  ! — yonder  see!" 

And  the  young  man  pointed  to  a  large  brindled  cat,  that, 
kept  hack  from  its  prey  by  our  unwelcome  neighbourhood,  still 
remained  watchful,  a  few  paces  oil",  stirring  its  tail  gently  back- 
wards and  forwards,  and  with  that  stealthy  look  in  its  round 
eyes,  dulled  by  the  sun — half  fierce,  half  frightened — which  be- 
longs to  its  tribe,  when  man  comes  between  the  devourer  and 
the  victim. 

"  I  do  see,"  said  I ;  "  but  a  passing  footstep  has  saved  the 
bird !" 

"  Stop !"  said  Vivian,  laying  my  hand  on  his  own — and  with 
his  old  bitter  smile  on  his  lip — "  stop  !  do  you  think  it  mercy 
to  save  the  bird?  What  from  and  what  for?  From  a  natu- 
ral enemy — from  a  short  pang  and  a  quick  death  ?  Fie ! — is 
not  that  better  than  slow  starvation?  or,  if  you  take  more 
heed  of  it,  than  the  prison-bars  of  a, cage?  You  cannot  re- 
store the  nest,  you  cannot  recall  the  parent !  Be  wiser  in  your 
mercy :  leave  the  bird  to  its  gentlest  fate  !" 

I  looked  hard  on  Vivian;  the  lip  had  lost  the  bitter  smile. 
He  rose  and  turned  away.  I  sought  to  take  up  the  poor  bird, 
but  it  did  not  know  its  friends,  and  ran  from  me,  chirping  pit- 
eously — ran  towards  the  very  jaws  of  the  grim  enemy.  I  was 
only  just  in  time  to  scare  away  the  beast,  which  sprang  up  a 
tree,  and  glared  down  through  the  hanging  boughs.  Then  I 
followed  the  bird,  and.  as  I  followed,  I  heard,  not  knowing  at 
firsl  whence  the  sound  came,  a  short,  quick,  tremulous  note. 
Was  it  near?  was  it  far? — from  the  earth? — in  the  sky? — 
Poor  parent-bird  !  like  parent-love,  it  seemed  now  far  and  now 
near;  now  on  earth,  now  in  sky! 

And  :ii  last,  quick  and  sudden,  as  if  born  of  the  space,  lo ! 
the  little  wings  hovered  over  me! 

The  young  bird  halted,  and  I  also. 

"  ( !ome,"  -aid  I,  "ye  have  found  each  other  at  last  ;  settle  it 
be1  ween  yon  |" 

I  weni  back  to  the  outcast. 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  40  7 


CHAPTER  II. 

Pisistratus. — "  How  came  you  to  know  we  had  stayed  in 
the  town  ?" 

Vivian. — "  Do  you  think  I  could  remain  where  you  left  me  ? 
I  wandered  out — wandered  hither.  Passing  at  dawn  through 
yon  streets,  I  saw  the  ostlers  loitering  about  the  gates  of  the 
yard,  overheard  them  talk,  and  so  knew  you  were  all  at  the  inn 
—all !"     (He  sighed  heavily.) 

Pisistratus.  —  "Your  poor  father  is  very  ill!  O  cousin, 
bow  could  you  fling  from  you  so  much  love  ?" 

Viviax. — "Love  ! — his  ! — my  father's !" 

Pisistratus. — "  Do  you  really  not  believe,  then,  that  your 
father  loved  you  ?" 

Viviax. — "  If  I  had  believed  it,  I  had  never  left  him !  All 
the  gold  of  the  Indies  had  never  bribed  me  to  leave  my 
mother !'' 

Pisistratus. — "This  is  indeed  a  strange  misconception  of 
yours.  If  we  can  remove  it,  all  may  be  well  yet.  Need  there 
now  be  any  secrets  between  us  ?"  (Persuasively) . — "  Sit  down, 
and  tell  me  all,  cousin." 

After  some  hesitation,  Vivian  complied  ;  and  by  the  clearing 
of  his  brow,  and  the  very  tone  of  his  voice,  I  felt  sure  that  he 
was  no  longer  seeking  to  disguise  the  truth.  But,  as  I  after- 
wards learned  the  father's  tale  as  well  as  now  the  son's,  so,  in- 
stead of  repeating  Vivian's  words,  which — not  by  design,  but 
by  the  twist  of  a  mind  habitually  wrong — distorted  the  facts, 
I  will  state  what  appears  to  me  the  real  case,  as  between  the 
parties  so  unhappily  opposed.  Reader,  pardon  me  if  the  re- 
cital be  tedious.  And  if  thou  thinkest  that  I  bear  not  hard 
enough  on  the  erring  hero  of  the  story,  remember,  that  he  who 
recites  judges  as  Austin's  son  must  judge  of  Roland's. 


4U8  Tim  caxtons: 


CHAPTER  III. 

VIVIAN. 

AT  THE   ENTRANCE   OF   LIFE   SITS — THE   MOTHER. 

It  was  during  the  war  in  Spain  that  a  severe  wound,  and  the 
fever  which  ensued,  detained  Roland  at  the  house  of  a  Spanish 
widow.  His  hostess  had  once  been  rich  ;  but  her  fortune  had 
been  ruined  in  the  general  calamities  of  the  country.  She  had 
an  only  daughter,  who  assisted  to  nurse  and  tend  the  wound- 
ed Englishman  ;  and  when  the  time  approached  for  Roland's 
departure,  the  frank  grief  of  the  young  Ramouna  betrayed  the 
impression  that  the  guest  had  made  upon  her  affections.  Much 
of  gratitude,  and  something,  it  might  be,  of  an  exquisite  sense 
of  honour,  aided,  in  Roland's  breast,  the  charm  naturally  pro- 
duced by  the  beauty  of  his  young  nurse,  and  the  knightly 
compassion  he  felt  for  her  ruined  fortunes  and  desolate  condi- 
tion. 

In  one  of  those  hasty  impulses  common  to  a  generous  nature 
— and  which  too  often  fatally  vindicate  the  rank  of  Prudence 
amidst  the  tutelary  Powers  of  Life — Roland  committed  the  er- 
ror of  marriage  with  a  girl  of  whose  connections  he  knew  noth- 
ing, and  of  whose  nature  little  more  than  its  warm  spontane- 
ous susceptibility.  In  a  few  days  subsequent  to  these  rash 
nuptials,  Roland  rejoined  the  march  of  the  army;  nor  was  he 
able  to  return  to  Spain  till  after  the  crowning  victory  of  Wa- 
terloo. 

Maimed  by  the  loss  of  a  limb,  and  with  the  scars  of  many  a 
noble  Mound  still  fresh,  Roland  then  hastened  to  a  home,  the 
dreams  of  which  had  soothed  the  bed  of  pain,  and  now  replaced 
the  earlier  visions  of  renown.  During  his  absence  a  son  had 
been  born  to  him — a  son  whom  he  might  rear  to  take  the  place 
he  had  Left  in  his  country's  service;  to  renew,  in  some  future 
fields,  a  career  that  had  failed  the  romance  of  his  own  antique 
and  chivalrous  :init»iii<>n.  As  soon  as  thai  news  had  reached 
him, his  care  had  been  to  provide  an  English  nurse  lor  the  in- 
fant—so  that,  with   the  first  sounds  of  the  mother's  endear- 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  409 

ments,  the  child  might  yet  hear  a  voice  from  the  father's  land. 
A  female  relation  of  Bolt's  had  settled  in  Spain,  and  was  in- 
duced to  undertake  this  duty.  Natural  as  this  appointment 
was  to  a  man  so  devotedly  English,  it  displeased  his  wild  and 
passionate  Ramouna.  She  had  that  mother's  jealousy,  stron- 
gest in  minds  uneducated ;  she  had  also  that  peculiar  pride 
which  belongs  to  her  country-people,  of  every  rank  and  con- 
dition ;  the  jealousy  and  the  pride  were  both  wounded  by  the 
sight  of  the  English  nurse  at  the  child's  cradle. 

That  Roland,  on  regaining  his  Spanish  hearth,  should  be  dis- 
appointed in  his  expectations  of  the  happiness  awaiting  him 
there,  was  the  inevitable  condition  of  such  a  marriage ;  since, 
not  the  less  for  his  military  bluntness,  Roland  had  that  refine- 
ment of  feeling,  perhaps  over-fastidious,  which  belongs  to  all 
natures  essentially  poetic :  and  as  the  first  illusions  of  love  died 
away,  there  could  have  been  little  indeed  congenial  to  his  state- 
ly temper  in  one  divided  from  him  by  an  utter  absence  of  edu- 
cation, and  by  the  strong,  but  nameless  distinctions  of  national 
views  and  maimers.  The  disappointment,  probably,  however, 
went  deeper  than  that  which  usually  attends  an  ill-assorted 
union ;  for,  instead,  of  bringing  his  wife  to  his  old  Tower  (an 
expatriation  which  she  would  doubtless  have  resisted  to  the 
utmost),  he  accepted,  maimed  as  he  was,  not  very  long  after 
his  return  to  Spain,  the  offer  of  a  military  post  under  Ferdi- 
nand. The  Cavalier  doctrines,  and  intense  loyalty  of  Roland 
attached  him,  without  reflection,  to  the  service  of  a  throne 
which  the  English  arms  had  contributed  to  establish ;  while 
the  extreme  unpopularity  of  the  Constitutional  Party  in  Spain, 
and  the  stigma  of  irreligion  fixed  to  it  by  the  priests,  aided  to 
foster  Roland's  belief  that  he  was  supporting  a  beloved  king 
against  the  professors  of  those  revolutionary  and  Jacobinical 
doctrines,  which  to  him  were  the  very  atheism  of  politics.  The 
experience  of  a  few  years  in  the  service  of  a  bigot  so  contempt- 
ible as  Ferdinand,  whose  highest  object  of  patriotism  was  the 
restoration  of  the  Inquisition,  added  another  disappointment 
to  those  which  had  already  embittered  the  life  of  a  man  who 
had  seen  in  the  grand  hero  of  Cervantes  no  follies  to  satirize, 
but  high  virtues  to  imitate.  Poor  Quixote  himself — he  came 
mournfully  back  to  his  La  Mancha,  with  no  other  reward  for 
his  knight-errantry  than  a  decoration  which  he  disdained  to 
place  beside  his  simple  Waterloo  medal,  and  a  grade  for  which 


410  the  OAXTON8  : 

he  wonlcl  have  blushed  to  resign  his  more  modest,  but  more 
honourable  English  dignity. 

But,  still  weaving  hopes,  the  sanguine  man  returned  to  his 
Penates.  His  child  had  now  grown  from  infancy  into  boyhood 
—the  child  would  pass  naturally  into  his  care.  Delightful  oc- 
cupation ! — At  the  thought  home  smiled  again. 

Now  behold  the  most  pernicious  circumstance  in  this  ill- 
omened  connection. 

The  father  of  Ramouna  had  been  one  of  that  strange  and 
mysterious  race  which  presents  in  Spain  so  many  features  dis- 
tinct from  the  characteristics  of  its  kindred  tribes  in  more  civ- 
ilized lands.     The  Gitano,  or  gipsy  of  Spain,  is  not  the  mere 
vagrant  we  see  on  our  commons  and  road-sides.     Retaining, 
indeed,  much  of  his  lawless  principles  and  predatory  inclina- 
tions, he  lives  often  in  towns,  exercises  various  callings,  and 
not  unfrequently  becomes  rich.     A  wealthy  Gitano  had  mar- 
ried a  Spanish  woman  :*  Roland's  wife  had  been  the  offspring 
of  this  marriage.     The  Gitano  had  died  while  Ramouna  was 
yet  extremely  young,  and  her  childhood  had  been  free  from 
the  influences  of  her  paternal  kindred.    But,  though  her  moth- 
er, retaining  her  own  religion,  had  brought  up  Ramouna  in  the 
same  faith,  pure  from  the  godless  creed  of  the  Gitano — and,  at 
her  husband's  death,  had  separated  herself  wholly  from  his 
tribe — still  she  had  lost  caste  with  her  own  kin  and  people. 
And,  while  struggling  to  regain  it,  the  fortune,  which  made 
her  sole  chance  of  success  in  that  attempt,  was  swept  away, 
so  that  she  had  remained  apart  and  solitary,  and  could  bring 
no  friends  to  cheer  the  solitude  of  Ramouna  during  Roland's 
absence.     But,  while  my  uncle  was  still  in  the  service  of  Fer- 
dinand, the  widow  died ;  and  then  the  only  relatives  who  came 
round  Ramouna  were  her  father's  kindred.     They  had  not 
ventured  to  claim  affinity  while  her  mother  lived ;  and  they 
did  so  now  by  attentions  and  caresses  to  her  son.     This  open- 
ed to  them  at  once  Ramouna's  heart  and  doors.     Meanwhile 
tin-  English  nurse — who,  in  spite  of  all  that  could  render  her 
abode  odious  to  her,  had,  from  strong  love  to  her  charge, 
stoutly  maintained  her  post — died,  a  few  weeks  after  Ramou- 
na's mother,  and  no  healthful  influence  remained  to  counteract 

*  A  Spaniard  very  rarely  indeed  marries  a  Gitano,  or  female  pipsy.     But 
tonally  (observes  Mr.  Borrow)  a  wealthy  Gitano  marries  a  Spanish  fe- 
male. 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  411 

those  baneful  ones  to  which  the  heir  of  the  honest  old  Caxtons 
was  subject.  But  Roland  returned  home  in  a  humour  to  be 
pleased  with  all  things.  Joyously  he  clasped  his  wife  to  his 
breast,  and  thought,  with  self-reproach,  that  he  had  forborne 
too  little,  and  exacted  too  much — he  would  be  wiser  now. 
Delightfully  he  acknowledged  the  beauty,  the  intelligence,  and 
manly  bearing  of  the  boy,  who  played  with  his  sword-knot, 
and  ran  off  with  his  pistols  as  a  prize. 

The  news  of  the  Englishman's  arrival  at  first  kept  the  law- 
less kinsfolk  from  the  house  ;  but  they  were  fond  of  the  boy, 
and  the  boy  of  them,  and  interviews  between  him  and  these 
wild  comrades,  if  stolen,  were  not  less  frequent.     Gradually 
Roland's  eyes  became  opened.     As,  in  habitual  intercourse, 
the  boy  abandoned  the  reserve  which  awe  and  cunning  at  first 
imposed,  Roland  was  inexpressibly  shocked  at  the  bold  princi- 
ples his  son  affected,  and  at  his  utter  incapacity  even  to  com- 
prehend that  plain  honesty  and  that  frank  honour  which,  to  the 
English  soldier,  seemed  ideas  innate  and  heaven-planted.    Soon 
afterwards,  Roland  found  that  a  system  of  plunder  was  carried 
on  in  his  household,  and  tracked  it  to  the  connivance  of  the 
wife  and  the  agency  of  his  son,  for  the  benefit  of  lazy  bravoes 
and  dissolute  vagrants.     A  more  patient  man  than  Roland 
might  well  have  been  exasperated — a  more  wary  man  con- 
founded by  this  discovery.     He  took  the  natural  step — per- 
haps insisting  on  it  too  summarily  —  perhaps  not  allowing 
enough  for  the  uncultured  mind  and  lively  passions  of  his  wife 
— he  ordered  her  instantly  to  prepare  to  accompany  him  from 
the  place,  and  to  abandon  all  communication  with  her  kindred. 
A  vehement  refusal  ensued ;  but  Roland  was  not  a  man  to 
give  up  such  a  point,  and  at  length  a  false  submission,  and  a 
feigned  repentance,  soothed  his  resentment  and  obtained  his 
pardon.     They  moved  several  miles  from  the  place ;  but  where 
they  moved,  there,  some  at  least,  and  those  the  worst,  of  the 
baleful  brood,  stealthily  followed.     Whatever  Ramouna's  ear- 
lier love  for  Roland  had  been,  it  had  evidently  long  ceased,  in 
the  thorough  want  of  sympathy  between  them,  and  in  that 
absence  which,  if  it  renews  a  strong  affection,  destroys  an  af- 
fection already  weakened.     But  the  mother  and  son  adored 
each  other  with  all  the  strength  of  their  strong,  wild  natures. 
Even  under  ordinary  circumstances,  the  father's  influence  over 
a  boy  yet  in  childhood  is  exerted  in  vain,  if  the  mother  lend 


1 1  2  THE  <  avion s  : 

herself  to  baffle  it.  And  in  this  miserable  position,  what 
chance  had  the  blunt,  stem,  honest  Roland  (separated  from 
hia  -"ii  during  the  most  ductile  years  of  infancy)  against  the 
ascendency  of  a  mother  who  humoured  all  the  faults,  and  grati- 
fied all  the  wishes,  of  her  darling? 

In  his  despair,  Roland  let  fall  the  threat  that,  if  thus  thwart- 
ed, it  would  become  his  duty  to  withdraw  his  son  from  the 
mother.  This  threal  instantly  hardened  both  hearts  against 
him.  The  wife  represented  Roland  to  the  boy  as  a  tyrant,  as 
:m  enemy  —  as  one  who  had  destroyed  all  the  happiness  they 
had  before  enjoyed  in  each  other — as  one  Avhose  severity  show- 
ed that  he  hated  his  own  child ;  and  the  boy  believed  her.  In 
his  own  house  a  firm  union  was  formed  against  Roland,  and 
protected  by  the  cunning  which  is  the  foi'ce  of  the  weak  against 
the  strong. 

In  spite  of  all,  Roland  could  never  forget  the  tenderness  with 
which  the  young  nurse  had  watched  over  the  wounded  man, 
nor  the  love  —  genuine  for  the  hour,  though  not  drawn  from 
the  feelings  which  withstand  the  wear  and  tear  of  life — that 
lips  so  beautiful  had  pledged  him  in  the  by-gone  days.  These 
thoughts  must  have  come  perpetually  between  his  feelings  and 
his  judgment,  to  embitter  still  more  his  position  —  to  harass 
still  more  his  heart.  And  if,  by  the  strength  of  that  sense  of 
duty  which  made  the  force  of  his  character,  he  could  have 
strung  himself  to  the  fulfilment  of  the  threat,  humanity,  at  all 
events,  compelled  him  to  delay  it — his  wife  promised  to  be  again 
a  mother.  How  could  he  take  the  infant  from  the  mother's 
breast,  or  abandon  the  daughter  to  the  fatal  influences  from 
which  only,  by  so  violent  an  effort,  he  could  free  the  son  ? 

No  wonder,  poor  Roland,  that  those  deep  furrows  contract- 
ed thy  bold  front,  and  thy  hair  grew  gray  before  its  time. 

Fortunately,  perhaps,  for  all  parties,  Roland's  wife  died 
while  Blanche  was  still  an  infant.  She  was  taken  ill  of  a  i'vwv 
— she  died  delirious,  clasping  her  boy  to  her  breast,  and  pray- 
ing the  saints  to  protect  him  from  his  cruel  father.  How  oft- 
en that  deathbed  haunted  the  son,  and  justified  his  belief  that 
there  was  no  parent's  love  in  the  heart  which  was  now  his  sole 
shelter  from  the  world,  and  the  "pelting  of  its  pitiless  rain/1 
Again  I  Bay, poor  Roland]  for  I  know  that,  in  that  harsh, un- 
loving disrupt  ure  of  such  solemn  ties,  thy  large,  generous  heart 
forgot   its  wrongs;  again  didst  thou  see  tender  eyes  bending 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  413 

over  the  wounded  stranger — again  hear  low  murmurs  breathe 
the  warm  weakness  which  the  women  of  the  south  deem  it  no 
shame  to  own.  And  now  did  it  all  end  in  those  ravings  of 
hate,  and  in  that  glazing  gaze  of  terror  ! 


CHAPTER  IV. 

THE    PEECEPTOE. 

Roland  removed  to  France,  and  fixed  his  abode  in  the  en- 
virons of  Paris.  He  placed  Blanche  at  a  convent  in  the  im- 
mediate neighbourhood,  going  to  see  her  daily,  and  gave  him- 
self up  to  the  education  of  his  son.  The  boy  was  apt  to  learn, 
but  to  unlearn  was  here  the  arduous  task — and  for  that  task  it 
would  have  needed  either  the  passionless  experience,  the  ex- 
quisite forbearance  of  a  practised  teacher,  or  the  love  and  con- 
fidence, and  yielding  heart  of  a  believing  pupil.  Roland  felt 
that  he  was  not  the  man  to  be  the  teacher,  and  that  his  son's 
heart  remained  obstinately  closed  to  him.  He  looked  round, 
and  found  at  the  other  side  of  Paris  what  seemed  a  suitable 
preceptor — a  young  Frenchman  of  some  distinction  in  letters, 
more  especially  in  science,  with  all  a  Frenchman's  eloquence  of 
talk,  full  of  high-sounding  sentiments  that  pleased  the  romantic 
enthusiasm  of  the  Captain ;  so  Roland,  with  sanguine  hopes, 
confided  his  son  to  this  man's  care.  "  The  boy's  natural  quick- 
ness mastered  readily  all  that  pleased  his  taste ;  he  learned  to 
speak  and  write  French  with  rare  felicity  and  precision.  His 
tenacious  memory,  and  those  flexile  organs  in  which  the  talent 
for  languages  is  placed,  served,  with  the  help  of  an  English 
master,  to  revive  his  earlier  knowledge  of  his  father's  tongue, 
and  to  enable  him  to  speak  it  with  fluent  correctness — though 
there  was  always  in  his  accent  something  which  had  struck  me 
as  si  range  ;  but  not  suspecting  it  to  be  foreign,  I  had  thought 
it  a  theatrical  affectation.  He  did  not  go  far  into  science — little 
farther,  perhaps,  than  a  smattering  of  French  mathematics  ;  but 
he  acquired  a  remarkable  facility  and  promptitude  in  cacula- 
tion.  He  devoured  eagerly  the  light  reading  thrown  in  his 
way,  and  picked  up  thence  that  kind  of  knowledge  which  nov- 
els and  plays  afford,  for  good  or  evil,  according  as  the  novel  or 
the  play  elevates  the  understanding  and  ennobles  the  passions, 
or  merely  corrupts  the  fancy,  and  lowers  the  standard  of  hu- 


t  1  t  THE  <  AXTons: 

man  nature  Bu1  of  all  thai  Roland  desired  him  to  be  taught, 
the  son  remained  as  ignoranl  :is  before.  Among  the  other  mis- 
fortunes of  this  ominous  marriage,  Roland's  wife  had  possess- 
ed all  the  Buperstitions  of  a  Roman  Catliolic  Spaniard,  and  with 
these  the  boy  had  unconsciously  intermingled  doctrines  far 
more  dreary,  imbibed  from  the  dark  paganism  of  the  Gitanos. 

Roland  had  sought  a  Protestant  for  his  son's  tutor.  The 
] ireceptor  was  nominally  a  Protestant — a  biting  derider  of  all 
superstitions,  indeed  !  He  was  such  a  Protestant  as  some  de- 
fender of  Voltaire's  religion  says  the  Great  Wit  w^ould  have 
been  had  he  lived  in  a  Protestant  country.  The  Frenchman 
laughed  the  boy  out  of  his  superstitions,  to  leave  behind  them 
the  sneering  scepticisms  of  the  Encyclopedic,  without  those 
redeeming  ethics  on  which  all  sects  of  philosophy  are  agreed, 
but  which,  unhappily,  it  requires  a  philosopher  to  comprehend. 

This  preceptor  was,  doubtless,  not  aware  of  the  mischief  he 
was  doing ;  and  for  the  rest  he  taught  his  pupil  after  his  own 
system — a  mild  and  plausible  one,  very  much  like  the  system 
we  at  home  are  recommended  to  adopt — "Teach  the  under- 
standing,— all  else  wall  follow;"  "Learn  to  read  something, 
and  it  will  all  come  right ;"  "  Follow  the  bias  of  the  pupil's 
mind  ;  thus  you  develop  genius,  not  thwart  it."  Mind,  under- 
standing, genius — fine  things!  But,  to  educate  the  whole 
man,  you  must  educate  something  more  than  these.  Not  for 
want  of  mind,  understanding,  genius,  have  Borgias  and  Xeros 
left  their  names  as  monuments  of  horror  to  mankind.  Where, 
in  all  this  teaching,  wTas  one  lesson  to  warm  the  heart  and 
guide  the  soul  ? 

Oh,  mother  mine !  that  the  boy  had  stood  by  thy  knee,  and 
heard  from  thy  lips  why  life  wras  given  us,  in  what  life  shall 
end,  and  how  heaven  stands  open  to  us  night  and  day !  Oh, 
lather  mine!  that  thou  hadst  been  his  preceptor,  not  in  book- 
learning,  but  the  heart's  simple  wisdom !  Oh  that  he  had 
learned  from  thee,  in  parables  closed  with  practice,  the  happi- 
ness of  self-sacrifice,  and  how  "good  deeds  should  repair  the 
bad!" 

It  was  the  misfortune  of  this  boy,  with  his  daring  and  his 
beauty,  that  there  was  in  his  exterior  and  his  manner  that 
which  attracted  indulgent  interest,  and  a  sort  of  compassion- 
ate admiration.  The  Frenchman  liked  him — believed  his  story 
— thought  him  ill-treated  by  that  hard-visaged  English  soldier. 


A   FAMILY   PICTUKE.  415 

All  English  people  were  so  disagreeable,  particularly  English 
soldiers ;  and  the  Captain  once  mortally  offended  the  French- 
man by  calling  Vilainton  un  grand  homme,  and  denying,  with 
brutal  indignation,  that  the  English  had  poisoned  Napoleon ! 
So,  instead  of  teaching  the  son  to  love  and  revere  his  father, 
the  Frenchman  shrugged  his  shoulders  when  the  boy  broke 
into  some  unfilial  complaint,  and  at  most  said,  "  Mais,  cher 
enfant,  ton  pere  est  Anglais, — c'est  tout  dire."  Meanwhile,  as 
the  child  sprang  rapidly  into  precocious  youth,  he  was  permit- 
ted a  liberty  in  his  hours  of  leisure  of  which  he  availed  himself 
with  all  the  zest  of  his  earlier  habits  and  adventurous  temper. 
He  formed  acquaintances  among  the  loose  young  haunters  of 
cafe's  and  spendthrifts  of  that  capital — the  wits  !  He  became 
an  excellent  swordsman  and  pistol-shot — adroit  in  all  games  in 
which  skill  helps  fortune.  He  learned  betimes  to  furnish  him- 
self with  money,  by  the  cards  and  the  billiard-balls. 

But,  delighted  with  the  easy  home  he  had  obtained,  he  took 
care  to  school  his  features  and  smooth  his  manner  in  his  fa- 
ther's visits — to  make  the  most  of  what  he  had  learned  of  less 
ignoble  knowledge,  and,  with  his  characteristic  imitativeness, 
to  cite  the  finest  sentiments  he  had  found  in  his  plays  and 
novels.  What  father  is  not  credulous  ?  Roland  believed,  and 
wept  tears  of  joy.  And  now  he  thought  the  time  was  come 
to  take  back  the  boy — to  return  with  a  worthy  heir  to  the  old 
Tower.  He  thanked  and  blessed  the  tutor — he  took  the  son. 
But,  under  pretence  that  he  had  yet  some  things  to  master, 
whether  in  book-knowledge  or  manly  accomplishments,  the 
youth  begged  his  father,  at  all  events,  not  yet  to  return  to 
England — to  let  him  attend  his  tutor  daily  for  some  months. 
Roland  consented,  moved  from  his  old  quarters,  and  took  a 
lodffinff  for  both  in  the  same  suburb  as  that  in  which  the 
teacher  resided.  But  soon,  when  they  were  under  one  roof, 
the  boy's  habitual  tastes,  and  his  repugnance  to  all  paternal 
authority,  were  betrayed.  To  do  my  unhappy  cousin  justice 
(such  as  that  justice  is),  though  he  had  the  cunning  for  a  short 
disguise,  he  had  not  the  hypocrisy  to  maintain  systematic  de- 
ceit. He  could  play  a  part  for  a  while,  from  an  exulting  joy 
in  his  own  address ;  but  he  could  not  wear  a  mask  with  the 
patience  of  cold-blooded  dissimulation.  Why  enter  into  pain- 
ful details,  so  easily  divined  by  the  intelligent  reader?  The 
faults  of  the  son  were  precisely  those  to  which  Roland  would 


UO  mi:  CAXTONS: 

be  least  indulgent.  To  the  ordinary  scrapes  of  high-spirited 
boyhood,  no  lather,  I  am  sure,  would  have  been  more  lenient ; 
but  to  anything  that  seemed  low,  petty — that  grated  on  him 
as  a  gentleman  and  soldier — there,  not  for  worlds  would  I 
have  braved  the  darkness  of  his  frown,  and  the  woe  that  spoke 
like  scorn  in  his  voice.  And  when,  after  all  warning  and  pro- 
hibition were  in  vain,  Roland  found  his  son,  in  the  middle  of 
the  night,  in  a  resort  of  gamblers  and  sharpers,  carrying  all 
before  him  with  his  cue,  in  the  full  flush  of  triumph,  and  a 
great  heap  of  five-franc  pieces  before  him,  you  may  conceive 
with  what  wrath  the  proud,  hasty,  passionate  man  drove  out, 
cane  in  hand,  the  obscene  associates,  flinging  after  them  the 
son's  ill-gotten  gains ;  and  with  what  resentful  humiliation  the 
son  was  compelled  to  follow  the  father  home.  Then  Roland 
took  the  boy  to  England,  but  not  to  the  old  Tower ;  that 
hearth  of  his  ancestors  was  still  too  sacred  for  the  footsteps 
of  the  vagrant  heir! 


CHAPTER  V. 

THE    HEARTH    WITHOUT   TRUST,  AND   THE   WORLD   WITHOUT   A 

OUIDE. 

And  then,  vainly  grasping  at  every  argument  his  blunt  sense 
could  suggest — then  talked  Roland  much  and  grandly  of  the 
duties  men  owed — even  if  they  threw  off  all  love  to  their  fa- 
ther— still  to  their  father's  name;  and  then  his  pride,  always 
so  lively,  grew  irritable  and  harsh,  and  seemed,  no  doubt,  to 
the  perverted  ears  of  the  son,  unlovely  and  unloving.  And 
that  pride,  without  serving  one  purpose  of  good,  did  yet  more 
mischief;  for  the  youth  caught  the  disease,  but  in  a  wrong 
way.     And  he  said  to  himself — 

"Ho,  then,  my  father  is  a  great  man,  with  all  these  ances- 
tors and  big  words !  And  he  has  lands  and  a  castle — and  yet 
how  miserably  we  live,  and  how  he  stints  me  I     But,  if  he  has 

cause   for  pride  in   all  these  dead  men,  why,  so  have  T.     And 

Ire  these  lodgings,  these  appurtenances,  fit  for  the  'gentleman' 

lie  says  I  am  V" 

Even  in  England,  the  gipsy  blood  broke  out  as  before,  and 
tin-   youth    found   vagrant    associates.  Heaven   knows  how  or 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  417 

where ;  and  strange-looking  forms  gaudily  shabby  and  disrep- 
utably smart,  were  seen  lurking  in  the  corner  of  the  street,  or 
peering  in  at  the  window,  slinking  on  if  they  saw  Roland — 
and  Roland  could  not  stoop  to  be  a  spy.  And  the  son's  heart 
grew  harder  and  harder  against  his  father,  and  his  father's  face 
now  never  smiled  on  him.  Then  bills  came  in,  and  dims 
knocked  at  the  door.  Bills  and  duns  to  a  man  who  shrunk 
from  the  thought  of  a  debt  as  an  ermine  from  a  sj^ot  on  its  fur ! 
And  the  son's  short  answer  to  remonstrance  was, — "Am  I 
not  a  gentleman  ? — these  are  the  things  gentlemen  require." 
Then  perhaps  Roland  remembered  the  experiment  of  his 
French  friend,  and  left  his  bureau  unlocked,  and  said,  "Ruin 
me  if  you  will,  but  no  debts.  There  is  money  in  those  draw- 
ers— they  are  unlocked."  That  trust  would  for  ever  have 
cured  of  extravagance  a  youth  with  a  high  and  delicate  sense 
of  honour :  the  pupil  of  the  Gitanos  did  not  understand  the 
trust;  he  thought  it  conveyed  a  natural,  though  ungracious 
permission  to  take  out  what  he  wanted — and  he  took !  To 
Roland  this  seemed  a  theft,  and  a  theft  of  the  coarsest  kind ; 
but  when  he  so  said,  the  son  started  indignant,  and  saw  in  that 
which  had  been  so  touching  an  appeal  to  his  honour,  but  a  trap 
to  decoy  him  into  disgrace.  In  short,  neither  could  under- 
stand the  other.  Roland  forbade  his  son  to  stir  from  the 
house  ;  and  the  young  man  the  same  night  let  himself  out,  and 
stole  forth  into  the  wide  world,  to  enjoy  or  defy  it  in  his  own 
wild  way. 

It  would  be  tedious  to  follow  him  through  his  various  ad- 
ventures and  experiments  on  fortune  (even  if  I  knew  them  all, 
which  I  do  not).  And  now  putting  altogether  aside  his  right 
name,  which  he  had  voluntarily  abandoned,  and  not  embar- 
rassing the  reader  with  the  earlier  aliases  assumed,  I  shall  give 
to  my  unfortunate  kinsman  the  name  by  which  I  first  knew 
him,  and  continue  to  do  so  until — Heaven  grant  the  time  may 
corne ! — having  first  redeemed,  he  may  reclaim,  his  own.  It 
was  in  joining  a  set  of  strolling  players  that  Vivian  became  ac- 
quainted with  Peacock;  and  that  worthy,  who  had  many 
strings  to  his  bow,  soon  grew  aware  of  Vivian's  extraordinary 
skill  with  the  cue,  and  saw  therein  a  better  mode  of  making 
their  joint  fortunes  than  the  boards  of  an  itinerant  Thespis  fur- 
nished to  either.  Vivian  listened  to  him,  and  it  was  while 
their  intimacy  was  most  fresh  that  I  met  them  on  the  high- 

S2 


1 1  B  THE  caxtoxs : 

road.  That  chance  meeting  produced  (if  I  may  be  allowed  to 
believe  his  assurance)  a  strong,  and,  for  the  moment,  a  salutary 
effect  croon  Vivian.  The  comparative  innocence  and  freshness 
of  a  boy's  mind  were  new  to  him;  the  elastic  healthful  spirits 
with  which  those  gifts  were  accompanied  startled  him,  by  the 
contrast  to  his  own  forced  gaiety  and  secret  gloom.  And 
this  boy  was  his  own  cousin! 

Coming  afterward  to  London,  he  adventured* inquiry  at  the 
hotel  in  the  Strand  at  which  I  had  given  my  address;  learned 
where  we  were;  and  passing  one  night  into  the  street,  saw 
my  micle  at  the  window — to  recognize  and  to  fly  from  him. 
Having  then  some  money  at  his  disposal,  he  broke  oft' abrupt- 
ly from  the  set  in  which  he  had  been  thrown.  He  had  resolved 
to  return  to  France — he  would  try  for  a  more  respectable  mode 
of  existence.  He  had  not  found  happiness  in  that  liberty  he 
had  won,  nor  room  for  the  ambition  that  began  to  gnaw  him, 
in  those  pursuits  from  which  his  father  had  vainly  warned  him. 
His  most  reputable  friend  was  his  old  tutor ;  he  would  go  to 
him.  He  went ;  but  the  tutor  was  now  married,  and  was  him- 
self a  father,  and  that  made  a  wonderful  alteration  in  his  prac- 
tical ethics.  It  was  no  longer  moral  to  aid  the  son  in  rebel- 
lion to  his  father.  Vivian  evinced  his  usual  sarcastic  haughti- 
ness at  the  reception  he  met,  and  was  requested  civilly  to  leave 
the  house.  Then  again  he  flung  himself  on  his  wits  at  Paris. 
But  there  were  plenty  of  wits  there  sharper  than  his  own.  He 
got  into  some  quarrel  with  the  police — not,  indeed,  for  any  dis- 
honest practices  of  his  own,  but  from  an  unwary  acquaintance 
with  others  less  scrupulous,  and  deemed  it  prudent  to  quit 
France.  Thus  had  I  met  him  again,  forlorn  and  ragged,  in  the 
streets  of  London. 

Meanwhile  Roland,  after  the  first  vain  search,  had  yielded  to 
the  indignation  and  disgust  that  had  long  rankled  within  him. 
His  son  had  thrown  off  his  authority,  because  it  preserved  him 
from  dishonour.  His  ideas  of  discipline  were  stern,  and  pa- 
tience had  been  well-nigh  crushed  out  of  his  heart.  He 
thought  he  could  bear  to  resign  his  son  to  his  fate — to  disown 
him,  and  to  say,  "I  have  no  more  a  son."  It  avms  in  this 
mood  thai  he  had  first  visited  our  house.  But  when,  on  that 
memorable  night  in  which  he  had  narrated  to  his  thrilling  list- 
eners the  dark  talc  of  a  fellow-sufferer's  woe  and  crime — bc- 
traying  in  the  tale,  to  my  father's  quick  sympathy,  his  own 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  419 

sorrow  and  passion — it  did  not  need  much  of  his  gentler  broth- 
er's subtle  art  to  learn  or  guess  the  whole,  nor  much  of  Austin's 
mild  persuasion  to  convince  Roland  that  he  had  not  yet  ex- 
hausted all  eiforts  to  track  the  wanderer  and  reclaim  the  err- 
ing child.  Then  he  had  gone  to  London — then  he  had  sought 
every  spot  which  the  outcast  would  probably  haunt — then  had 
he  saved  and  pinched  from  his  own  necessities  to  have  where- 
withal to  enter  theatres  and  gaming-houses,  and  fee  the  agen- 
cies of  police ;  then  had  he  seen  the  form  for  which  he  had 
watched  and  pined,  in  the  street  below  his  window,  and  cried, 
in  a  joyous  delusion,  "  He  repents !"  One  day  a  letter  reach- 
ed my  uncle,  through  his  bankers,  from  the  French  tutor  (who 
knew  of  no  other  means  of  tracing  Roland  but  through  the 
house  by  which  his  salary  had  been  paid),  informing  him  of  his 
son's  visit.  Roland  started  instantly  for  Paris.  Arriving 
there,  he  could  only  learn  of  his  son  through  the  police,  and 
from  them  only  learn  that  he  had  been  seen  in  the  company  of 
accomplished  swindlers,  who  were  already  in  the  hands  of  jus- 
tice ;  but  that  the  youth  himself,  whom  there  was  nothing  to 
criminate,  had  been  suffered  to  quit  Paris,  and  had  taken,  it 
was  supposed,  the  road  to  England.  Then,  at  last,  the  poor 
Captain's  stout  heart  gave  way.  His  son  the  companion  of 
swindlers  ! — could  he  be  sure  that  he  was  not  their  accomplice? 
If  not  yet,  how  small  the  step  between  companionship  and 
participation !  He  took  the  child  left  him  still  from  the  con- 
vent, returned  to  England,  and  arrived  there  to  be  seized  with 
fever  and  delirium — apparently  on  the  same  day  (or  a  day  be- 
fore that  on  which)  the  son  had  dropped,  shelterless  and  pen- 
niless, on  the  stones  of  London. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

THE   ATTEMPT  TO    BUILD    A  TEMPLE   TO    FORTUNE    OUT    OF   THE 
RUINS    OF   HOME. 

"  But,"  said  Vivian,  pursuing  his  tale,  "  but  when  you  came 
to  my  aid,  not  knowing  me — when  you  relieved  me — when 
from  your  own  lips,  for  the  first  time,  I  heard  words  that 
praised  me,  and  for  qualities  that  implied  I  might  yet  be 
'worth  much' — Ah!  (he  added  mournfully)  I  remember  the 
very  words — a  new  light  broke  upon  me — struggling  and  dim, 


120  i  m:  i  ajctons: 

but  light  still.  The  ambition  with  which  I  had  Bought  the 
truckling  Frenchman  revived,  and  took  worthier  and  more 
definite  form.  I  would  lift  myself  above  the  mire,  make  a 
name,  rise  in  life !" 

Vivian's  head  drooped,  but  lie  raised  it  quickly,  and  laughed 
— his  low,  mocking  laugh.  What  follows  of  this  tale  may  be 
told  succinctly.  Retaining  his  Litter  feelings  towards  his 
father,  he  resolved  to  continue  his  incognito — lie  gave  himself 
a  name  likely  to  mislead  conjecture,  if  I  conversed  of  him  to 
my  family,  since  he  knew  that  Roland  was  aware  that  a  Col- 
onel Vivian  had  been  afflicted  by  a  runaway  son — and,  indeed, 
the  talk  upon  that  subject  had  first  put  the  notion  of  flight  into 
his  own  head.  He  caught  at  the  idea  of  becoming  known  to 
Trevanion;  but  he  saw  reasons  to  forbid  his  being  indebted  to 
me  for  the  introduction — to  forbid  my  knowing  where  he  was : 
sooner  or  later  that  knowledge  could  scarcely  fail  to  end  in  the 
discovery  of  his  real  name.  Fortunately,  as  he  deemed,  for  the 
plans  he  began  to  meditate,  we  were  all  leaving  London — he 
should  have  the  stage  to  himself.  And  then  boldly  he  resolved 
upon  what  he  regarded  as  the  master-scheme  of  life — viz.  to 
obtain  a  small  pecuniary  independence,  and  to  emancipate  him- 
self formally  and  entirely  from  his  father's  control.  Aware  of 
poor  Roland's  chivalrous  reverence  for  his  name,  firmly  per- 
suaded that  Roland  had  no  love  for  the  son,  but  only  the  dread 
that  the  son  might  disgrace  him,  he  determined  to  avail  him- 
self of  his  father's  prejudices  in  order  to  effect  his  purpose. 

He  wrote  a  short  letter  to  Roland  (that  letter  which  had 
given  the  poor  man  so  sanguine  a  joy — that  letter  after  read- 
ing which  he  had  said  to  Blanche,  "  pray  for  me"),  stating 
simply  that  he  wished  to  see  his  father,  and  naming  a  tavern 
in  the  City  for  the  meeting. 

The  interview  took  place.  And  when  Roland,  love  and  for- 
giveness  in  his  heart, — but  (who  shall  blame  him?)  dignity  on 
his  brow  and  rebuke  in  his  eye — approached,  ready  at  a  word 
to  nine?  himself  on  the  boy's  breast,  Vivian,  seeing  only  the 
outer  signs,  and  interpreting  them  by  his  own  sentiments — 
•iled,  folded  his  arms  on  his  bosom,  and  said  coldly,  "Spare 
me  reproach,  sir — it  is  unavailing.  I  seek  you  only  to  propose 
that  yon  shall  save  your  name  and  resign  your  son." 

Then,  intent  perhaps  but  to  gain  his  object,  the  unhappy 
youth  declared  liis  fixed  determination  never  to  live  with  his 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  421 

father,  never  to  acquiesce  in  his  authority,  resolutely  to  pursue 
his  own  career,  whatever  that  career  might  be,  explaining  none 
of  the  circumstances  that  appeared  most  in  his  disfavour — 
rather,  perhaps,  thinking  that,  the  worse  Ins  father  judged  of 
him,  the  more  chance  he  had  to  achieve  his  purpose.  "  All  I 
ask  of  you,"  he  said,  "  is  this :  Give  me  the  least  you  can  af- 
ford to  preserve  me  from  the  temptation  to  rob,  or  the  neces- 
sity to  starve ;  and  I,  in  my  turn,  promise  never  to  molest  you 
in  life — never  to  degrade  you  in  my  death ;  whatever  my  mis- 
deeds, they  will  never  reflect  on  yourself,  for  you  shall  never 
recognize  the  misdoer !  The  name  you  prize  so  highly  shall  be 
spared."  Sickened  and  revolted,  Roland  attempted  no  argu- 
ment— there  was  that  in  the  son's  cold  manner  which  shut  out 
hope,  and  against  which  his  pride  rose  indignant.  A  meeker 
man  might  have  remonstrated,  implored,  and  wept — that  was 
not  in  Roland's  nature.  He  had  but  the  choice  of  three  evils, 
to  say  to  his  son,  "  Fool,  I  command  thee  to  folio w  me !"  or 
say,  "  Wretch,  since  thou  wouldst  cast  me  off  as  a  strauger,  as 
a  stranger  I  say  to  thee — Go,  starve  or  rob  as  thou  wilt!"  or 
lastly,  to  bow  his  proud  head,  stunned  by  the  blow,  and  say, 
"  Thou  refusest  me  the  obedience  of  the  son,  thou  demandest 
to  be  as  the  dead  to  me.  I  can  control  thee  not  from  vice,  I 
can  guide  thee  not  to  virtue.  Thou  wouldst  sell  me  the  name 
I  have  inherited  stainless,  and  have  as  stainless  borne.  Be  it 
so  ! — Name  thy  price !" 

And  something  like  this  last  was  the  father's  choice. 

He  listened,  and  was  long  silent ;  and  then  he  said  slowly, 
"  Pause  before  you  decide." 

"  I  have  paused  long— my  decision  is  made !  this  is  the  last 
time  we  meet.  I  see  before  me  now  the  way  to  fortune,  fair- 
ly, honourably;  you  can  aid  me  in  it  only  in  the  way  I  have 
said.  Reject  me  how,  and  the  option  may  never  come  again 
to  either !" 

And  then  Roland  said  to  himself,  "  I  have  spared  and  saved 
for  this  son ;  what  care  I  for  aught  else  than  enough  to  live 
without  debt,  creep  into  a  corner,  and  await  the  grave !  And 
the  more  I  can  give,  why,  the  better  chance  that  he  will  abjure 
the  vile  associate  and  the  desperate  course."  And  so,  out  of 
his  small  income,  Roland  surrendered  to  the  rebel  child  more 
than  the  half. 

Vivian  was  not  aware  of  his  father's  fortune — he  did  not 


422  THE    (AX  TONS  I 

suppose  the  Bum  of  two  hundred  pounds  a-year  was  an  allow- 
ance  bo  disproportioned  to  Roland's  means — yet  when  it  was 
named,  even  he  was  struck  by  the  generosity  of  one  to  whom 
he  himself  had  given  the  right  to  say,  "I  take  thee  at  thy  word; 
'just  enough  not  to  starve.'  " 

Jhit  then  that  hateful  cynicism  which,  caught  from  bad  men 
and  evil  books,  he  called  "  knowledge  of  the  world,"  made  him 
think  "it  is  not  for  me,  it  is  only  for  his  name;"  and  he  said 
aloud,  u  I  accept  these  terms,  sir ;  here  is  the  address  of  a  solic- 
itor witli  whom  yours  can  settle  them.     Farewell  for  ever." 

At  those  last  words  Roland  started,  and  stretched  out  his 
arms  vaguely  like  a  blind  man.  But  Vivian  had  already 
thrown  open  the  window  (the  room  wras  on  the  ground-floor), 
and  sprang  upon  the  sill.  "  Farewell,"  he  repeated :  "  tell  the 
world  I  am  dead." 

He  leapt  into  the  street,  and  the  father  drew  in  the  out- 
stretched arms,  smote  his  heart,  and  said — "  Well,  then,  my 
task  in  the  world  of  man  is  over !  I  will  back  to  the  old  ruin 
— the  wrreck  to  the  wTrecks — and  the  sight  of  tombs  I  have  at 
least  rescued  from  dishonour  shall  comfort  me  for  all !" 


CHAPTER  VII. 

THE    RESULTS PERVERTED   AMBITION SELFISH    PASSION — TIIE 

INTELLECT  DISTORTED  BY  TIIE  CROOKEDNESS  OF  TIIE  HEART. 

Vivian's  schemes  thus  prospered.  He  had  an  income  that 
permitted  him  the  outward  appearance  of  a  gentleman — an  in- 
dependence, modest  indeed,  but  independence  still.  We  were 
all  gone  from  London.  One  letter  to  me  with  the  postmark 
of  the  town  near  which  Colonel  Vivian  lived,  sufficed  to  con- 
linn  my  belief  in  his  parentage,  and  in  his  return  to  his  friends. 
lie  then  presented  himself  to  Trevanion  as  the  young  man 
whose  pen  I  hud  employed  in  the  member's  service;  and  know- 
ing that  I  had  never  mentioned  his  name  to  Trevanion — for, 
without  Vivian's  permission,  I  should  not,  considering  his  ap- 
parent trust  in  me,  have  deemed  myself  authorized  to  do  so — 
lie  took  that  of  Gower,  which  lie  selected  haphazard, from  an 

old  Court  Guide,  as  having  the  advantage — in   common  with 
moBl   name-  borne  by  the  higher  nobility  of  England — of  not 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  423 

being  confined,  as  the  ancient  names  of  untitled  gentlemen  usu- 
ally are,  to  the  members  of  a  single  family.  And  when,  with 
his  wonted  adaptability  and  suppleness,  he  had  contrived  to  lay 
aside,  or  smooth  over,  whatever  in  his  manners  would  be  cal- 
culated to  displease  Trevanion,  and  had  succeeded  in  exciting 
the  interest  which  that  generous  statesman  always  conceived 
for  ability,  he  owned,  candidly,  one  day,  in  the  presence  of  Lady 
Ellinor — for  his  experience  had  taught  him  the  comparative 
ease  with  which  the  sympathy  of  woman  is  enlisted  in  any- 
thing that  appeals  to  the  imagination,  or  seems  out  of  the  or- 
dinary beat  of  life — that  he  had  reasons  for  concealing  his  con- 
nections for  the  present — that  he  had  cause  to  believe  I  sus- 
pected what  they  were,  and,  from  mistaken  regard  for  his  wel- 
fare, might  acquaint  his  relations  with  his  Avhereabout.  He 
therefore  begged  Trevanion,  if  the  latter  had  occasion  to  write 
to  me,  not  to  mention  him.  This  promise  Trevanion  gave, 
though  reluctantly;  for  the  confidence  volunteered  to  him 
seemed  to  exact  the  promise ;  but  as  he  detested  mystery  of 
all  kinds,  the  avowal  might  have  been  fatal  to  any  farther  ac- 
quaintance ;  and  under  auspices  so  doubtful,  there  would  have 
been  no  chance  of  his  obtaining  that  intimacy  in  Trevanion's 
house  which  he  desired  to  establish,  but  for  an  accident  which 
at  once  opened  that  house  to  him  almost  as  a  home. 

Vivian  had  always  treasured  a  lock  of  his  mother's  hair,  cut 
off  on  her  deathbed ;  and  when  he  was  at  his  French  tutor's, 
his  first  pocket-money  had  been  devoted  to  the  purchase  of  a 
locket,  on  which  he  had  caused  to  be  inscribed  his  own  name 
and  his  mother's.  Through  all  his  wanderings  he  had  worn 
this  relic :  and  in  the  direst  pangs  of  want,  no  hunger  had  been 
keen  enough  to  induce  him  to  part  with  it.  Now,  one  morn- 
ing the  ribbon  that  suspended  the  locket  gave  way,  and  his 
eye  resting  on  the  names  inscribed  on  the  gold,  he  thought,  in 
his  own  vague  sense  of  right,  imperfect  as  it  was,  that  his  com- 
pact with  his  father  obliged  him  to  have  the  names  erased. 
He  took  it  to  a  jeweller  in  Piccadilly  for  that  purpose,  and 
gave  the  requisite  order,  not  taking  notice  of  a  lady  in  the  fur- 
ther part  of  the  shop.  The  locket  was  still  on  the  counter  aft- 
er Vivian  had  left,  when  the  lady  coming  forward  observed  it, 
and  saw  the  names  on  the  surface.  She  had  been  struck  by 
the  peculiar  tone  of  the  voice,  which  she  had  heard  before ; 
and  that  very  day  Mr.  Gower  received  a  note  from  Lady  Elli- 


42  1  THE   CAXTONS  : 

nor  Trevanion,  requesting  to  sec  him.  Much  wondering,  lie 
went.  Presenting  him  with  the  locket,  she  said,  smiling, 
"There  is  only  one  gentleman  in  the  world  who  calls  himself 

I),  Oaxton,  unless  it  be  his  son.  Ah!  I  see  now  why  you 
wished  to  conceal  yourself  from  my  friend  Pisistratus.  But 
how  is  this?  can  you  have  any  difference  with  your  lather? 
Confide  in  me,  or  it  is  my  duty  to  write  to  him." 

Even  Vivian's  powers  of  dissimulation  abandoned  him,  thus 
taken  by  surprise,  lie  saw  no  alternative  but  to  trust  Lady 
Ellinor  with  his  secret,  and  implore  her  to  respect  it.  And 
then  he  spoke  bitterly  of  his  father's  dislike  to  him,  and  his 
own  resolution  to  prove  the  injustice  of  that  dislike  by  the  po- 
sition he  would  himself  establish  in  the  world.  At  present,  his 
father  believed  him  dead,  and  perhaps  was  not  ill-pleased  to 
think  so.  He  would  not  dispel  that  belief  till  he  conld  redeem 
any  boyish  errors,  and  force  his  family  to  be  proud  to  acknowl- 
edge him. 

Though  Lady  Ellinor  was  slow  to  believe  that  Roland  could, 
dislike  his  son,  she  could  yet  readily  believe  that  lie  was  harsh 
and  choleric,  with  a  soldier's  high  notions  of  discipline :  the 
young  man's  story  moved  her,  his  determination  pleased  her 
own  high  spirit ;  always  with  a  touch  of  romance  in  her,  and 
always  sympathizing  with  each  desire  of  ambition,  she  entered 
into  Vivian's  aspirations  with  an  alacrity  that  surprised  him- 
self. She  was  charmed  with  the  idea  of  ministering  to  the 
son's  fortunes,  and  ultimately  reconciling  him  to  the  father — 
through  her  own  agency ; — it  would  atone  for  any  fault  of 
which  Roland  could,  accuse  herself  in  the  old  time. 

She  undertook  to  impart  the  secret  to  Trevanion,  for  she 
would  have  no  secrets  from  him,  and  to  secure  his  acquiescence 
in  its  concealment  from  all  others. 

And  here  I  must  a  little  digress  from  the  chronological 
course  of  my  explanatory  narrative,  to  inform  the  reader  that, 
when  Lady  Ellinor  had  her  interview  with  Roland,  she  had 
been  repelled  by  the  sternness  of  his  manner  from  divulging 
Vivian's  secret.  Rut  on  her  lirst  attempt  to  sound  or  concili- 
ate  him,  she  had  begun  with  some  eulogies  on  Trevanion's  new 
friend  and  assistant,  Mr.Gower,  and  had  awakened  Roland's 
suspicions  of  that  person's  identity  with  his  son — suspicions 
which  had  given  him  a  terrible  interest  in  our  joint  deliver- 
ance of  Miss  Trevanion.     Hut  so  heroically  had  the  poor  sol- 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  425 

dier  sought  to  resist  his  own  fears,  that  on  the  way  he  shrank 
to  put  to  me  the  questions  that  might  paralyze  the  energies 
which,  whatever  the  answer,  were  then  so  much  needed. 
"  For,"  said  he  to  my  father,  "  I  felt  the  blood  surging  to  my 
temples  ;  and  if  I  had  said  to  Pisistratus, 4  Describe  this  man,' 
and  by  his  description  I  had  recognized  my  son,  and  dreaded 
lest  I  might  be  too  late  to  arrest  him  from  so  treacherous  a 
crime,  my  brain  would  have  given  way ; — and  so  I  did  not 
dare!" 

I  return  to  the  thread  of  my  story.  From  the  time  that 
Vivian  confided  in  Lady  Ellinor,  the  way  was  cleared  to  his 
most  ambitious  hopes  ;  and  though  his  acquisitions  were  not 
sufficiently  scholastic  and  various  to  permit  Trevanion  to  select 
him  as  a  secretary,  yet,  short  of  sleeping  at  the  house,  he  was 
little  less  intimate  there  than  I  had  been. 

Among  Vivian's  schemes  of  advancement,  that  of  winning 
the  hand  and  heart  of  the  great  heiress  had  not  been  one  of 
the  least  sanguine.  This  hope  was  annulled  when,  not  long 
after  his  intimacy  at  her  father's  house,  she  became  engaged  to 
young  Lord  Castleton.  But  he  could  not  see  Miss  Trevanion 
with  impunity — (alas  !  who,  with  a  heart  yet  free,  could  be  in- 
sensible to  attractions  so  winning  ?)  He  permitted  the  love — 
such  love  as  his  wild,  half-educated,  half-savage  nature  ac- 
knowledged— to  creep  into  his  soul — to  master  it ;  but  he  felt 
no  hope,  cherished  no  scheme  while  the  young  lord  lived. 
With  the  death  of  her  betrothed,  Fanny  was  free ;  then  he  be- 
gan to  hope — not  yet  to  scheme.  Accidentally  he  encounter- 
ed Peacock — partly  from  the  levity  that  accompanied  a  false 
goodnature  that  was  constitutional  with  him,  partly  from  a 
vague  idea  that  the  man  might  be  useful,  Vivian  established 
his  quondam  associate  in  the  service  of  Trevanion.  Peacock 
soon  gained  the  secret  of  Vivian's  love  for  Fanny,  and,  dazzled 
by  the  advantages  that  a  marriage  with  Miss  Trevanion  would 
confer  on  his  patron,  and  might  reflect  on  himself,  and  delight- 
ed at  an  occasion  to  exercise  his  dramatic  accomplishments  on 
the  stage  of  real  life,  he  soon  practised  the  lesson  that  the 
theatres  had  taught  him — viz.  to  make  a  sub-intrigue  between 
maid  and  valet  serve  the  schemes  and  insure  the  success  of  the 
lover.  If  Vivian  had  some  opportunities  to  imply  his  admira- 
tion, Miss  Trevanion  gave  him  none  to  plead  his  cause.  But 
the  softness  of  her  nature,  and  that  graceful  kindness  which 


426  the  caxtons: 

surrounded  her  like  an  atmosphere,  emanating  unconsciously 
from  a  girl's  harmless  desire  to  please,  tended  to  deceive  him. 
1  lis  uw  n  personal  gifts  were  so  rare,  and,  in  his  wandering  life, 
the  effect  they  had  produced  had  so  increased  his  reliance  on 
them,  that  he  thought  he  wanted  but  the  fair  opportunity  to 
woo  in  order  to  win.  In  this  state  of  mental  intoxication, 
Trevanion  having  provided  for  his  Scotch  secretary,  took  him 

to  Lord  N 's.     His  hostess  was  one  of  those  middle-aged 

ladies  of  fashion,  who  like  to  patronize  and  bring  forward 
young  men,  accepting  gratitude  for  condescension,  as  a  hom- 
age to  beauty.  She  was  struck  by  Vivian's  exterior,  and  that 
"  picturesque"  in  look  and  in  manner  which  belonged  to  him. 
Naturally  garrulous  and  indiscreet,  she  was  unreserved  to  a 
pupil  whom  she  conceived  the  whim  to  make  "  au  fait  to  so- 
ciety." Thus  she  talked  to  him,  among  other  topics  in  fashion, 
of  Miss  Trevanion,  and  expressed  her  belief  that  the  present 
Lord  Castleton  had  always  admired  her ;  but  it  was  only  on 
his  accession  to  the  marquisate  that  he  had  made  up  his  mind 
to  marry,  or,  from  his  knowledge  of  Lady  Ellinor's  ambition, 
thought  that  the  Marquess  of  Castleton  might  achieve  the 
prize  which  would  have  been  refused  to  Sir  Sedley  Beaude- 
sert.  Then,  to  corroborate  the  predictions  she  hazarded,  she 
repeated,  perhaps  with  exaggeration,  some  passages  from  Lord 
Castleton's  replies  to  her  own  suggestions  on  the  subject. 
Vivian's  alarm  became  fatally  excited ;  unregulated  passions 
easily  obscured  a  reason  so  long  perverted,  and  a  conscience 
so  habitually  dulled.  There  is  an  instinct  in  all  intense  affec- 
tion (whether  it  be  corrupt  or  pure)  that  usually  makes  its 
jealousy  prophetic.  Thus,  from  the  first,  out  of  all  the  bril- 
liant idlers  round  Fanny  Trevanion,  my  jealousy  had  pre-emi- 
nently fastened  on  Sir  Sedley  Beaudescrt,  though,  to  all  seem- 
ing, without  a  cause.  From  the  same  instinct, Vivian  had  con- 
ceived  the  same  vague  jealousy  —  a  jealousy,  in  his  instance, 
coupled  with  a  deep  dislike  to  his  supposed  rival,  who  had 
wounded  his  self-love.  For  the  Marquess,  though  to  be 
haughty  or  ill-bred  was  impossible  to  the  blandness  of  his  na- 
ture, had  never  shown  to  Vivian  the  genial  courtesies  he  had 
lavished  upon  me,  and  kept  politely  aloof  from  his  acquaint- 
ance—  while  Vivian's  personal  vanity  had  been  wounded  by 
thai  drawing-room  effect  which  the  proverbial  winner  of  all 
hearts  produced  without  an  effort — an  effect  that  threw  into 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  427 

the  shade  the  youth  and  the  beauty  (more  striking,  but  infi- 
nitely less  prepossessing)  of  the  adventurous  rival.  Thus  ani- 
mosity to  Lord  Castleton  conspired  with  Vivian's  passion  for 
Fanny  to  rouse  all  that  was  worst  by  nature  and  by  rearing  in 
this  audacious  and  turbulent  spirit. 

His  confidant  Peacock  suggested,  from  his  stage  experience, 
the  outlines  of  a  plot,  to  which  Vivian's  astuter  intellect  in- 
stantly gave  tangibility  and  colouring.  Peacock  had  already 
found  Miss  Trevanion's  waiting-woman  ripe  for  any  measure 
that  might  secure  himself  as  her  husband,  and  a  provision  for 
life  as  a  reward.  Two  or  three  letters  between  them  settled 
the  preliminary  engagements.  A  friend  of  the  ex-comedian's 
had  lately  taken  an  inn  on  the  north  road,  and  might  be  relied 
upon.  At  that  inn  it  was  settled  that  Vivian  should  meet  Miss 
Trevanion,  whom  Peacock,  by  the  aid  of  the  abigail,  engaged 
to  lure  there.  The  sole  difficulty  that  then  remained  would, 
to  most  men,  have  seemed  the  greatest — viz.  the  consent  of 
Miss  Trevanion  to  a  Scotch  marriage.  But  Vivian  hoped  all 
things  from  his  own  eloquence,  art,  and  passion ;  and  by  an 
inconsistency,  however  strange,  still  not  unnatural  in  the  twists 
of  so  crooked  an  intellect,  he  thought  that,  by  insisting  on  the 
intention  of  her  parents  to  sacrifice  her  youth  to  the  very  man 
of  whose  attractions  he  was  most  jealous — by  the  picture  of 
disparity  of  years,  by  the  caricature  of  his  rival's  foibles  and 
frivolities,  by  the  commonplaces  of  "  beauty  bartered  for  am- 
bition," &c,  he  might  enlist  her  fears  of  the  alternative  on  the 
side  of  the  choice  urged  upon  her.  The  plan  proceeded,  the 
time  came :  Peacock  pretended  the  excuse  of  a  sick  relation  to 
leave  Trevanion  ;  and  Vivian  a  day  before,  on  pretence  of  vis- 
iting the  picturesque  scenes  in  the  neighbourhood,  obtained 
leave  of  absence.     Thus  the  plot  went  on  to  its  catastrophe. 

"And  I  need  not  ask,"  said  I,  trying  in  vain  to  conceal  my 
indignation,  "how  Miss  Trevanion  received  your  monstrous 
proposition !" 

Vivian's  pale  cheek  grew  paler,  but  he  made  no  reply. 

"And  if  we  had  not  arrived,  what  would  you  have  done? 
Oh,  dare  you  look  into  the  gulf  of  infamy  you  have  escaped!" 

"  I  cannot,  and  I  will  not  bear  this !"  exclaimed  Vivian,  start- 
ing up.  "  I  have  laid  my  heart  bare  before  you,  and  it  is  un- 
generous and  unmanly  thus  to  press  upon  its  wounds.  You 
can  moralize,  you  can  speak  coldly — but — I — I  loved  !" 


428  i  ii  i:  <  axtons  : 

"And  do  you  think,"  I  burst  forth — "do  you  think  that  I 
did  Dot  love  too? — love  longer  than  you  have  done;  better 
than  you  have  done;  gone  through  sharper  struggles,  darker 
days,  more  Bleeplesa  nights  than  you, — and  yet — " 

Vivian  caught  hold  of  me. 

"Hush!"  he  cried;  "is  this  indeed  true?  I  thought  you 
might  have  had  some  faint  and  fleeting  fancy  for  Miss  Trevan- 
ion,  but  that  you  curbed  and  conquered  it  at  once.  Oh  no  !  it 
was  impossible  to  have  loved  really,  and  to  have  surrendered 
all  chance  as  you  did ! — have  left  the  house,  have  fled  from  her 
presence  !     No — no  !  that  was  not  love !" 

"It  was  love  !  and  I  pray  Heaven  to  grant  that,  one  day,  you 
may  know  how  little  your  aftection  sprang  from  those  feelings 
which  make  true  love  sublime  as  honour,  and  meek  as  is  re- 
ligion !  Oh !  cousin,  cousin — with  those  rare  gifts,  what  you 
might  have  been !  what,  if  you  will  pass  through  repentance, 
and  cling  to  atonement — what,  I  dare  hope,  you  may  yet  be. 
Talk  not  now  of  your  love ;  I  talk  not  of  mine !  Love  is  a 
thing  gone  from  the  lives  of  both.  Go  back  to  earlier  thoughts, 
to  heavier  wrongs!  —  your  father! — that  noble  heart  which 
you  have  so  wantonly  lacerated,  which  you  have  so  little  com- 
prehended!" 

Then  with  all  the  warmth  of  emotion  I  hurried  on — showed 
him  the  true  nature  of  honour  and  of  Roland  (for  the  names 
were  one) — showed  him  the  watch,  the  hope,  the  manly  anguish 
I  had  witnessed,  and  wept — I,  not  his  son — to  see ;  showed  him 
the  poverty  and  privation  to  which  the  father,  even  at  the  last, 
had  condemned  himself,  so  that  the  son  might  have  no  excuse 
for  the  sins  that  Want  whispers  to  the  weak.  This,  and  much 
more,  and  I  suppose  with  the  pathos  that  belongs  to  all  earn- 
estness, I  enforced,  sentence  after  sentence — yielding  to  no  in- 
terruption, over-mastering  all  dissent ;  driving  in  the  truth,  nail 
after  nail,  as  it  were,  into  the  obdurate  heart,  that  I  constrained 
and  grappled  to.  And  at  last,  the  dark,  bitter,  cynical  nature 
gave  way,  and  the  young  man  fell  sobbing  at  my  feet,  and  cried 
aloud,  "Spare  me,  spare  me!  I  sec  it  all  now!  Wretch  that  I 
have  been  I" 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  429 


CHAPTER  VIIL 

Ox  leaving  Vivian  I  did  not  presume  to  promise  him  Ro- 
land's immediate  pardon.  I  did  not  urge  him  to  attempt  to 
see  his  lather.  I  felt  the  time  was  not  come  for  either  pardon 
or  interview.  I  contented  myself  with  the  victory  I  had  al- 
ready gained.  I  judged  it  right  that  thought,  solitude,  and 
suffering  should  imprint  more  deeply  the  lesson,  and  prepare 
the  way  to  the  steadfast  resolution  of  reform.  I  left  him  seat- 
ed by  the  stream,  and  with  the  promise  to  inform  him  at  the 
small  hostelry,  where  he  took  up  his  lodgings,  how  Roland 
struggled  through  his  illness. 

On  returning  to  the  inn,  I  was  uneasy  to  see  how  long  a 
time  had  elapsed  since  I  had  left  my  uncle.  But  on  coming 
into  his  room,  to  my  surprise  and  relief,  I  found  him  up  and 
dressed,  with  a  serene,  though  fatigued  expression  of  counte- 
nance. He  asked  me  no  questions  where  I  had  been — perhaps 
from  sympathy  with  my  feelings  in  parting  with  Miss  Trevan- 
ion — perhaps  from  conjecture  that  the  indulgence  of  those  feel- 
ings had  not  wholly  engrossed  my  time. 

But  he  said  simply,  "I  think  I  understood  from  you  that 
you  had  sent  for  Austin — is  it  so  ?" 

"  Yes,  sir ;  but  I  named  *  *  *,  as  the  nearest  point  to  the 
Tower,  for  the  place  of  meeting." 

"Then  let  us  go  hence  forthwith — nay,  I  shall  be  better  for 
the  change.  And  here,  there  must  be  curiosity,  conjecture — 
torture  !" — said  he,  locking  his  hands  tightly  together :  "  or- 
der the  horses  at  once !" 

I  left  the  room  accordingly ;  and  while  they  were  getting 
ready  the  horses,  I  ran  to  the  place  where  I  had  left  Vivian. 
He  was  still  there,  in  the  same  attitude,  covering  his  face  with 
his  hands,  as  if  to  shut  out  the  sun.  I  told  him  hastily  of  Ro- 
land's improvement,  of  our  approaching  departure,  and  asked 
him  an  address  in  London  at  which  I  could  find  him.  He  gave 
me  as  his  direction  the  same  lodging  at  which  I  had  so  often 
visited  him.  "  If  there  be  no  vacancy  there  for  me,"  said  he, 
"  I  shall  leave  word  where  I  am  to  be  found.  But  I  would 
gladly  be  where  I  Avas  before — "  He  did  not  finish  the  sen- 
tence.    I  pressed  his  hand,  and  left  him. 


4o0  1  hi-:  <  A\m\>: 


CHAPTER  IX. 

Some  days  have  elapsed:  we  arc  in  London,  my  father  with 
as;  and  Roland  has  permitted  Austin  to  tell  me  his  tale,  and 
receive  through  Austin  all  that  Vivian's  narrative  to  me  sug- 
gested, whether  in  extenuation  of  the  past,  or  in  hope  of  re- 
demption in  the  future.  And  Austin  has  inexpressibly  soothed 
his  brother.  And  Roland's  ordinary  roughness  has  gone,  and 
his  looks  are  meek,  and  his  voice  low.  But  he  talks  little,  and 
smiles  never.  He  asks  me  no  questions ;  does  not  to  me  name 
his  son,  nor  recur  to  the  voyage  to  Australia,  nor  ask  "why 
it  is  put  off;"  nor  interest  himself  as  before  in  preparations 
for  it — he  has  no  heart  for  anything. 

The  voyage  is  put  off  till  the  next  vessel  sails,  and  I  have 
seen  Vivian  twice  or  thrice,  and  the  result  of  the  interviews 
has  disappointed  and  depressed  me.  It  seems  to  me  that  much 
of  the  previous  effect  I  had  produced  is  already  obliterated. 
At  the  very  sight  of  the  great  Babel — the  evidence  of  the  ease, 
the  luxury,  the  wealth,  the  pomp  ; — the  strife,  the  penury,  the 
famine,  and  the  rags,  which  the  focus  of  civilization,  in  the  dis- 
parities of  old  societies,  inevitably  gathers  together — the  fierce 
combative  disposition  seemed  to  awaken  again ;  the  perverted 
ambition,  the  hostility  to  the  world  ;  the  wrath,  the  scorn ;  the 
war  with  man,  and  the  rebellious  murmur  against  Heaven. 
There  was  still  the  one  redeeming  point  of  repentance  for  his 
wrongs  to  his  father — his  heart  was  still  softened  there;  and, 
attendant  on  that  softness,  I  hailed  a  principle  more  like  that 
of  honour  than  I  had  yet  recognized  in  Vivian.  He  cancelled 
the  agreement  which  had  assured  him  of  a  provision  at  the 
cost  of  his  fnher's  comforts.  "At  least,  there,"  he  said,  "I 
will  injure  him  no  more!" 

I  Jut  while,  on  this  point,  repentance  seemed  genuine,  it  was 
not  so  with  regard  to  his  conduct  towards  Miss  Trevanion. 
His  gipsy  nurture,  his  loose  associates,  his  extravagant  French 
romances,  his  theatrical  mode  of  looking  upon  love  intrigues 
and  Btage  plots,  seemed  all  to  rise  between  his  intelligence  and 
tin-  due  sense  of  the  fraud  and  treachery  he  had  practised.    He 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  431 

seemed  to  feel  more  shame  at  the  exposure  than  at  the  guilt ; 
more  despair  at  the  failure  of  success  than  gratitude  at  escape 
from  crime.  In  a  word,  the  nature  of  a  whole  life  was  not  to 
be  remodelled  at  once — at  least  by  an  artificer  so  unskilled  as  I. 

After  one  of  these  interviews,  I  stole  into  the  room  where 
Austin  sat  with  Roland,  and,  watching  a  seasonable  moment 
when  Roland,  shaking  oif  a  reverie,  opened  his  Bible,  and  sat 
down  to  it,  with  each  muscle  in  his  face  set,  as  I  had  seen  it 
before,  into  iron  resolution,  I  beckoned  my  father  from  the 
room. 

Pisistratus. — "I  have  again  seen  my  cousin.  I  cannot 
make  the  way  I  wished.     My  dear  father,  you  must  see  him." 

Me.  Caxton. — "T? — yes,  assuredly,  if  1  can  be  of  any  serv- 
ice.    But  will  he  listen  to  me  ?" 

Pisistratus. — "  I  think  so.  A  young  man  will  often  respect 
in  his  elder,  what  he  will  resent  as  a  presumption  in  his  con- 
temporary." 

Mr.  Caxtox. — "  It  may  be  so :  (then  more  thoughtfully) 
but  you  describe  this  strange  boy's  mind  as  a  wreck ! — in  what 
part  of  the  mouldering  timbers  can  I  fix  the  grappling-hook  ? 
Here,  it  seems  that  most  of  the  supports  on  which  we  can  best 
rely,  when  we  would  save  another,  fail  us.  Religion,  honour, 
the  associations  of  childhood,  the  bonds  of  home,  filial  obe- 
dience— even  the  intelligence  of  self-interest,  in  the  philosophi- 
cal sense  of  the  word.  And  I,  too! — a  mere  bookman!  My 
dear  son ! — I  despair !" 

Pisistratus. — "  No,  you  do  not  despair, — no,  you  must  suc- 
ceed ;  for,  if  you  do  not,  what  is  to  become  of  Uncle  Roland  ? 
Do  you  not  see  his  heart  is  fast  breaking  ?" 

Mr.  Caxtox. — "Get  me  my  hat;  I  will  go.  I  will  save 
this  Ishmael — I  will  not  leave  him  till  he  is  saved !" 

Pisistratus  (some  minutes  after,  as  they  are  walking  to- 
wards Vivian's  lodging). — "You  ask  me  what  support  you 
are  to  cling  to.     A  strong  and  a  good  one,  sir." 

Mr.  Caxton.— "  Ah !  what  is  that  ?" 

Pisistratus. — "  Affection !  there  is  a  nature  capable  of 
strong  affection  at  the  core  of  this  wild  heart !  He  could  love 
his  mother ;  tears  gush  to  his  eyes  at  her  name — he  would 
have  starved  rather  than  part  with  the  memorial  of  that  love. 
It  was  his  belief  in  his  father's  indifference,  or  dislike,  that  hard- 
ened and  embruted  him — it  is  only  when  he  hears  how  that  fa- 


432  i 'HE  <  a. \ tons: 

ther  Loved  him,  that  T  now  melt  his  pride  and  curb  his  passions. 
You  have  affection  to  deal  with! — do  yon  despair  now?" 

My  father  turned  on  me  those  eyes  so  inexpressibly  benign 
and  mild,  and  replied  softly,  "No!" 

We  reached  the  house;  and  my  father  said,  as  Ave  knocked 
at  the  door,  "  If  he  is  at  home,  leave  me.  This  is  a  hard  study 
to  which  you  have  set  me  ;  I  must  work  at  it  alone." 

Vivian  was  at  home,  and  the  door  closed  on  his  visitor.  My 
father  stayed  some  hours. 

On  returning  home,  to  my  great  surprise,  I  found  Trevanion 
with  my  uncle.  lie  had  found  us  out — no  easy  matter,  I  should 
think.  But  a  good  impulse  in  Trevanion  was  not  of  that  fee- 
ble kind  which  turns  home  on  the  sight  of  a  difficulty.  He  had 
come  to  London  on  purpose  to  see  and  to  thank  us. 

I  did  not  think  there  had  been  so  much  of  delicacy — of  what 
I  may  call  the  "  beauty  of  kindness" — in  a  man  whom  incessant 
business  had  rendered  ordinarily  blunt  and  abrupt.  I  hardly 
recognized  the  impatient  Trevanion  in  the  soothing,  tender, 
subtle  respect  that  rather  implied  than  spoke  gratitude,  and 
sought  to  insinuate  what  he  owed  to  the  unhappy  father,  with- 
out touching  on  his  wrongs  from  the  son.  But  of  this  kind- 
ness— which  showed  how  Trevanion's  high  nature  of  a  gentle- 
man raised  him  aloof  from  that  coarseness  of  thought  which 
those  absorbed  wholly  in  practical  affairs  often  contract — of 
this  kindness,  so  noble  and  so  touching,  Roland  seemed  scarce- 
ly aware.  He  sat  by  the  embers  of  the  neglected  fire,  his 
hands  grasping  the  arms  of  his  elbow-chair,  his  head  drooping 
on  his  bosom ;  and  only  by  a  deep  hectic  flush  on  his  dark 
cheek  could  you  have  seen  that  he  distinguished  between  an 
ordinary  visitor  and  the  man  whose  child  he  had  helped  to 
save.  This  minister  of  state — this  high  member  of  the  elect, 
at  whose  gifl  arc  places,  peerages,  gold  sticks,  and  ribbons  — 
has  nothing  at  his  command  for  the  bruised  spirit  of  the  half- 
pay  soldier.  Before  that  poverty,  that  grief,  and  that  pride, 
the  King's  Counsellor  was  powerless.  Only  when  Trevanion 
rose  to  depart,  something  like  a  sense  of  the  soothing  inten- 
tion which  the  visil  implied  seemed  to  rouse  the  repose  of  the 
old  man,  and  to  break  the  ice  :il  its  surface;  for  he  followed 
Trevanion  to  the  door,  took  both  his  hands,  pressed  them,  then 
turned  away,  and  resumed  his  seat.  Trevanion  beckoned  to 
lip.  ami  I  followed  him  down  stairs,  and  into  a  little  parlour 
which  was  unoccupied. 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  433 

After  some  remarks  upon  Roland,  full  of  deep  and  consider- 
ate feeling,  and  one  quick,  hurried  reference  to  the  son — to  the 
effect  that  his  guilty  attempt  would  never  be  known  by  the 
world — Trevanion  then  addressed  himself  to  me  with  a  warmth 
and  urgency  that  took  me  by  surprise.  "  After  what  has  pass- 
ed," he  exclaimed,  "  I  cannot  suffer  you  to  leave  England  thus. 
Let  me  not  feel  with  you,  as  with  your  uncle,  that  there  is 
nothing  by  which  I  can  repay — no,  I  will  not  so  put  it — stay 
and  serve  your  country  at  home :  it  is  my  prayer,  it  is  Ellinor's. 
Out  of  all  at  my  disposal  it  will  go  hard  but  what  I  shall  find 
something  to  suit  you."  And  then,  hurrying  on,  Trevanion 
spoke  flatteringly  of  my  pretensions,  in  right  of  birth  and  capa- 
bilities, to  honourable  employment,  and  placed  before  me  a  pic- 
ture of  public  life — its  prizes  and  distinctions — which,  for  the 
moment  at  least,  made  my  heart  beat  loud  and  my  breath  come 
quick.  But  still,  even  then,  I  felt  (was  it  an  unreasonable  pride?) 
that  there  was  something  that  jarred,  something  that  humbled, 
in  the  thought  of  holding  all  my  fortunes  as  a  dependency  on 
the  father  of  the  woman  I  loved,  but  might  not  aspire  to  ;  — 
something  even  of  personal  degradation  in  the  mere  feeling 
that  I  was  thus  to  be  repaid  for  a  service,  and  recompensed  for 
a  loss.  But  these  were  not  reasons  I  could  advance ;  and,  in- 
deed, so  for  the  time  did  Trevanion's  generosity  and  eloquence 
overpower  me,  that  I  could  only  falter  out  my  thanks,  and  my 
promise  that  I  would  consider  and  let  him  know. 

With  that  promise  he  was  forced  to  content  himself;  he  told 
me  to  direct  to  him  at  his  favourite  country-seat,  whither  he 
was  going  that  day,  and  so  left  me.  I  looked  round  the  hum- 
ble parlour  of  the  mean  lodging-house,  and  Trevanion's  words 
came  again  before  me  like  a  flash  of  golden  light.  I  stole  into 
the  open  air,  and  wandered  through  the  crowded  streets,  agi- 
tated and  disturbed. 


CHAPTER  X. 

Several  days  elapsed — and  of  each  day  my  father  spent  a 
considerable  part  at  Vivian's  lodgings.  But  he  maintained  a 
reserve  as  to  his  success,  begged  me  not  to  question  him,  and 
to  refrain  also  for  the  present  from  visiting  my  cousin.  My 
uncle  guessed  or  knew  his  brother's  mission ;  for  I  observed 

T 


4:U  i  in.    (  AJCTONfl  ! 

that,  whem  rer  Austin  wont  noiselessly  away,  his  eye  bright- 
ened,  and  the  colour  rose  in  a  hectic  Hush  to  his  cheek.  At 
last  my  father  came  to  me  one  morning,  his  carpet-bag  in  his 
hand,  and  said,  "1  am  going  away  for  a  week  or  two.  Keep 
Roland  company  till  I  return." 

"Going  with  him?" 

"  With  him." 

"That  is  a  good  sign." 

"  I  hope  so  :  that  is  all  I  can  say  now." 

The  week  had  not  quite  passed  when  I  received,  from  my 
father  the  letter  I  am  about  to  place  before  the  reader,  and  you 
may  judge  how  earnestly  his  soul  must  have  been  in  the  task 
it  had  volunteered,  if  yon  observe  how  little,  comparatively 
speaking,  the  letter  contains  of  the  subtleties  and  pedantries 
(may  the  last  word  be  pardoned,  for  it  is  scarcely  a  just  one) 
which  ordinarily  left  my  father  a  scholar  even  in  the  midst  of 
his  emotions.  He  seemed  here  to  have  abandoned  his  books, 
to  have  put  the  human  heart  before  the  eyes  of  his  pupil,  and. 
said,  "  Read  and  sm-learn !" 

"  To    PlSISTRATUS    CAXTON. 

"  My  dear  Sox, — It  were  needless  to  tell  you  all  the  earlier 
difficulties  I  have  had  to  encounter  with  my  charge,  nor  to  re- 
peat all  the  means  which,  acting  on  your  suggestion  (a  correct 
one),  I  have  employed  to  arouse  feelings  long  dormant  and 
confused,  and  allay  others,  long  prematurely  active  and  terri- 
bly distinct.  The  evil  was  simply  this :  here  was  the  intelli- 
gence of  a  man  in  all  that  is  evil,  and  the  ignorance  of  an  in- 
fant in  all  that  is  good.  In  matters  merely  worldly,  what 
wonderful  acumen  !  in  the  plain  principles  of  right  and  wrong, 
what  gross  and  stolid  obtuseness !  At  one  time,  I  am  strain- 
ing all  my  poor  wit  to  grapple  in  an  encounter  on  the  knot- 
tiest mysteries  of  social  life ;  at  another,  I  am  guiding  reluctant 
fingers  over  the  horn-book  of  the  most  obvious  morals.  Here 
hieroglyphics,  and  there  pot-hooks.  But  as  long  as  there  is 
affection  in  a  man,  why,  there  is  Nature  to  begin  with!  To 
get  rid  of  all  the  rubbish  laid  upon  her,  clear  back  the  way  to 
thai  Nature,  and  start  afresh — that  is  one's  only  chance. 

k-  Well,  by  degrees  I  won  my  way,  waiting  patiently  till  the 
bosom,  pleased  with  the  relief,  disgorged  itself  of  all  the  *  per- 
ilous  Stuff,' — not    chiding — not   even    remonstrating,  seeming 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  435 

almost  to  sympathize,  till  I  got  him,  Somatically,  to  disprove 
himself.  When  I  saw  that  he  no  longer  feared  me — that  my 
company  had  become  a  relief  to  him — I  proposed  an  excursion, 
and  did  not  tell  him  whither. 

"Avoiding  as  much  as  possible  the  main  north  road  (for  I 
did  not  wish,  as  you  may  suppose,  to  set  fire  to  a  train  of  asso- 
ciations that  might  blow  us  up  to  the  dog-star),  and  where 
that  avoidance  was  not  possible,  travelling  by  night,  I  got  him 
into  the  neighbourhood  of  the  old  Tower.  I  would  not  admit 
him  under  its  roof.  But  you  know  the  little  inn,  three  miles 
oif,  near  the  trout  stream  ? — we  made  our  abode  there. 

"  Well,  I  have  taken  him  into  the  village,  preserving  his  in- 
cognito. I  have  entered  with  him  into  cottages,  and  turned 
the  talk  upon  Roland.  You  know  how  your  uncle  is  adored ; 
you  know  what  anecdotes  of  his  bold  warm-hearted  youth 
once,  and  now  of  his  kind  and  charitable  age,  would  spring  up 
from  the  garrulous  lips  of  gratitude !  I  made  him  see  with 
his  own  eyes,  hear  with  his  own  ears,  how  all  who  know  Ro- 
land loved  and  honoured  him — except  his  son.  Then  I  took 
him  round  the  ruins — (still  not  suffering  him  to  enter  the 
house),  for  those  ruins  are  the  key  to  Roland's  character — see- 
ing them,  one  sees  the  pathos  in  his  poor  foible  of  family  pride. 
There,  you  distinguish  it  from  the  insolent  boasts  of  the  pros- 
perous, and  feel  that  it  is  little  more  than  the  pious  reverence 
to  the  dead — '  the  tender  culture  of  the  tomb.'  We  sat  down 
on  heaps  of  mouldering  stone,  and  it  was  there  that  I  explained 
to  him  what  Roland  was  in  youth,  and  what  he  had  dreamed 
that  a  son  would  be  to  him.  I  showed  him  the  graves  of  his 
ancestors,  and  explained  to  him  why  they  were  sacred  in  Ro- 
land's eyes !  I  had  gained  a  great  way,  when  he  longed  to 
enter  the  home  that  should  have  been  his ;  and  I  could  make 
him  pause  of  his  own  accord,  and  say,  '  No,  I  must  first  be 
worthy  of  it.'  Then  you  would  have  smiled — sly  satirist  that 
you  are — to  have  heard  me  impressing  upon  this  acute,  sharp- 
witted  youth,  all  that  we  plain  folk  understand  by  the  name 
of  home — its  perfect  trust  and  truth,  its  simple  holiness,  its 
exquisite  happiness — being  to  the  world  what  conscience  is  to 
the  human  mind.  And  after  that,  I  brought  in  his  sister,  whom 
till,  then  he  had  scarcely  named — for  whom  he  scarcely  seemed 
to  care — brought  her  in  to  aid  the  father,  and  endear  the  home. 
4  And  you  knoAv,'  said  I, '  that  if  Roland  were  to  die,  it  would 


436  i  in:   <  -a\  CONS  : 

be  a  brother's  duty  to  suppl^his  place;  to  shield  her  imuv 
(•(■nee— to  protecl  her  name]  -V  good  name  is  something, 
then.  Your  father  was  not  so  wrong  to  prize  it.  You  would 
like  yours  to  be  that  which  your  sister  would  be  proud  to 
own  !' 

"  While  we  were  talking,  Blanche  suddenly  came  to  the 
spot,  and  rushed  to  my  arms.  She  looked  on  him  as  a  stran- 
ger; but  I  saw  his  knees  tremble.  And  then  she  was  about 
to  put  her  hand  in  his — but  I  drew  her  back.  Was  I  cruel  ? 
He  thought  so.  But  when  I  dismissed  her,  I  replied  to  his  re- 
proach, '  Your  sister  is  a  part  of  Home.  If  you  think  yourself 
worthy  of  either,  go  and  claim  both  ;  I  will  not  object.' — '  She 
has  my  mother's  eyes,'  said  he,  and  walked  away.  I  left  him 
to  muse  amidst  the  ruins,  while  I  went  in  to  see  your  poor 
mother,  and  relieve  her  fears  about  Roland,  and  make  her  un- 
derstand why  I  could  not  yet  return  home. 

"  This  brief  sight  of  his  sister  has  sunk  deep  into  him.  But 
I  now  approach  what  seems  to  me  the  great  difficulty  of  the 
whole.  He  is  fully  anxious  to  redeem  his  name — to  regain  his 
home.  So  far  so  well.  But  he  cannot  yet  see  ambition,  ex- 
cept with  hard  worldly  eyes.  He  still  fancies  that  all  he  has 
to  do  is  to  get  money  and  power,  and  some  of  those  empty 
prizes  in  the  Great  Lottery,  which  we  often  win  more  easily 
by  our  sins  than  our  virtues.  (Here  follows  a  long  passage 
from  Seneca,  omitted  as  superfluous.)  He  does  not  yet  even 
understand  me — or,  if  he  does,  he  fancies  me  a  mere  book- 
worm indeed,  when  I  imply  that  he  might  be  poor,  and  ob- 
scure, at  the  bottom  of  fortune's  wheel,  and  yet  be  one  we 
should  be  proud  of!  He  supposes  that,  to  redeem  his  name, 
he  has  only  got  to  lacker  it.  Don't  think  me  merely  the  fond 
father,  when  I  add  my  hope  that  I  shall  use  you  to  advantage 
here.  I  mean  to  talk  to  him  to-morrow,  as  we  return  to 
London,  of  you,  and  of  your  ambition :  you  shall  hear  the 
result. 

"  At  this  moment  (it  is  past  midnight),  I  hear  his  step  in  the 
room  above  me.  The  window-sash  aloft  opens — for  the  third 
(Ume  :  would  to  heaven  he  could  read  the  true  astrology  of  the 
stars!  There  they  an — bright,  luminous,  benignant.  And  I 
seeking  to  chain  this  wandering  comet  into  the  harmonies  of 
heaven  !  Better  task  than  thai  of  astrologers,  and  astronomers 
to  boot!      Who  among  them  can  'loosen  the  band  of  Orion*/1 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  437 

■ — but  who  amongst  us  may  not  be  permitted  by  God  to  have 
sway  over  the  action  and  orbit  of  the  human  soul? 

"  Your  ever  affectionate  father,  A.  C." 

Two  days  after  the  receipt  of  this  letter  came  the  following ; 
and  though  I  would  fain  suppress  those  references  to  myself 
which  must  be  ascribed  to  a  father's  partiality,  yet  it  is  so 
needful  to  retain  them  in  connection  with  Vivian,  that  I  have 
no  choice  but  to  leave  the  tender  flatteries  to  the  indulgence 
of  the  kind  : — 

"  My  deae  Sox, — I  was  not  too  sanguine  as  to  the  effect 
that  your  simple  story  would  produce  upon  your  cousin.  With- 
out implying  any  contrast  to  his  own  conduct,  I  described  that 
scene  in  which  you  threw  yourself  upon  our  sympathy,  in  the 
struggle  between  love  and  duty,  and  asked  for  our  counsel  and 
support ;  when  Roland  gave  you  his  blunt  advice  to  tell  all  to 
Trevanion;  and  when,  amidst  such  sorrow  as  the  heart  in 
youth  seems  scarcely  large  enough  to  hold,  you  caught  at  truth 
impulsively,  and  the  truth  bore  you  safe  from  the  shipwreck. 
I  recounted  your  silent  and  manly  struggles — your  resolution 
not  to  suffer  the  egotism  of  passion  to  unfit  you  for  the  aims 
and  ends  of  that  spiritual  probation  which  we  call  life.  I 
showed  you  as  you  were,  still  thoughtful  for  us,  interested  in 
our  interests — smiling  on  us  that  we  might  not  guess  that  you 
wept  in  secret !  Oh,  my  son — my  son  !  do  not  think  that,  in 
those  times,  I  did  not  feel  and  pray  for  you !  And  while  he 
was  melted  by  my  own  emotion,  I  turned  from  your  love  to 
your  ambition.  I  made  him  see  that  you,  too,  had  known  the 
restlessness  which  belongs  to  young  ardent  natures ;  that  you, 
too,  had  your  dreams  of  fortune,  and  aspirations  for  success. 
But  I  painted  that  ambition  in  its  true  colours :  it  was  not  the 
desire  of  a  selfish  intellect,  to  be  in  yourself  a  somebody — a 
something — raised  a  step  or  two  in  the  social  ladder,  for  the 
pleasure  of  looking  down  on  those  at  the  foot,  but  the  warmer 
yearning  of  a  generous  heart :  your  ambition  was  to  repair 
your  father's  losses — minister  to  your  father's  very  foible,  in 
his  idle  desire  of  fame — supply  to  your  uncle  what  he  had  lost 
in  his  natural  heir — link  your  success  to  useful  objects,  your 
interest  to  those  of  your  kind,  your  reward  to  the  proud  and 
grateful  smiles  of  those  vou  loved.     That  was  thine  ambition, 


438  THE   CAXTONS  : 

0  my  tender  Anachronism!    And  when,  as  I  closed  the  sketch, 

1  said,  '  PardoD  me:  you  know  not  what  delighl  a  father  feels, 
when,  while  sending  a  son  away  from  him  into  the  world,  lie 
can  Bpeak  and  think  thus  of  him!  But  this,  you  see,  is  not 
your  kind  of  ambition.  Let  us  talk  of  making  money,  and 
driving  a  eoaeh-and-four  through  tins  villanous  world,' — your 
eousin  sank  into  a  profound  reverie ;  and  when  he  woke  from 
ii.  it  was  like  the  waking  of  the  earth  after  a  night  in  spring — 
the  bare  trees  had  put  forth  buds ! 

"  And  some  time  after,  he  startled  me  by  a  prayer  that  I 
would,  permit  him,  with  his  father's  Consent,  to  accompany 
you  to  Australia.  The  only  answer  I  have  given  him  as  yet, 
lias  been  in  the  form  of  a  question  :  'Ask  yourself  if  I  ought. 
I  cannot  wish  Pisistratus  to  be  other  than  he  is ;  and  unless 
you  agree  with  him  in  all  his  principles  and  objects,  ought  I 
to  incur  the  risk  that  you  should  give  him  your  knowledge  of 
the  world,  and  inoculate  him  with  your  ambition  ?'  He  was 
struck,  and  had  the  candour  to  attempt  no  reply. 

"Now,  Pisistratus,  the  doubt  I  expressed  to  him  is  the 
doubt  I  feel.  For,  indeed,  it  is  only  by  home-truths,  not  re- 
fining arguments,  that  I  can  deal  with  this  unscholastic  Scyth- 
ian, who,  fresh  from  the  Steppes,  comes  to  puzzle  me  in  the 
portico. 

"  On  the  one  hand,  what  is  to  become  of  him  in  the  Old 
World  ?  At  his  age,  and  with  his  energies,  it  would  be  im- 
possible to  cage  him  with  us  in  the  Cumberland  ruins;  weari- 
ness and  discontent  would  undo  all  we  could  do.  He  has  no 
resource  in  books — and,  I  fear,  never  will  have !  But  to  send 
him  forth  into  one  of  the  overcrowded  professions;  to  place 
him  amidst  all  those  'disparities  of  social  life,'  on  the  rough 
si  ones  of  which  he  is  perpetually  grinding  his  heart ;  turn  him 
adrift  amongst  all  the  temptations  to  which  he  is  most  prone; 
tlii-  is  a  trial  which,  I  fear,  will  be  too  sharp  for  a  conversion 
so  incomplete.  In  the  New  World,  no  doubt,  his  energies 
would  find  a  safer  iield ;  and  even  the  adventurous  and  desul- 
tory habits  of  his  childhood  might  there  be  put  to  healthful 
account.  Those  complaints  of  the  disparities  of  the  civilized 
world  find,  I  suspect,  an  easier,  if  a  bluffer  reply  from  the  po- 
litical economist  than  the  Stoic  philosopher.  'You  don't  like 
them,  yon  find  it  hard  to  submit  to  them,'  says  the  political 
economist  ;  'but  they  are  the  laws  of  a  civilized  state,  and  you 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  439 

can't  alter  them.  Wiser  men  than  you  have  tried  to  alter 
them,  and  never  succeeded,  though  they  turned  the  earth 
topsy-turvy!  Very  well;  but  the  world  is  wide — go  into  a 
state  that  is  not  so  civilized.  The  disparities  of  the  Old  World 
vanish  amidst  the- New!  Emigration  is  the  reply  of  Nature 
to  the  rebellious  cry  against  Art.'  Thus  would  say  the  polit- 
ical economist ;  and,  alas,  even  in  your  case,  my  son,  I  found 
no  reply  to  the  reasonings !  I  acknowledge,  then,  that  Aus- 
tralia might  open  the  best  safety-valve  to  your  cousin's  discon- 
tent and  desires;  but  I  acknowledge  also  a  counter-truth, 
which  is  this — '  It  is  not  permitted  to  an  honest  man  to  cor- 
rupt himself  for  the  sake  of  others.'  That  is  almost  the  only 
maxim  of  Jean  Jacques  to  which  I  can  cheerfully  subscribe ! 
Do  you  feel  quite  strong  enough  to  resist  all  the  influences 
which  a  companionship  of  this  kind  may  subject  you  to ;  strong 
enough  to  bear  his  burthen  as  well  as  your  own ;  strong 
enough,  also — ay,  and  alert  and  vigilant  enough — to  prevent 
those  influences  harming  the  others,  whom  you  have  under- 
taken to  guide,  and  whose  lots  are  confided  to  you  ?  Pause 
well,  and  consider  maturely,  for  this  must  not  depend  upon  a 
generous  impulse.  I  think  that  your  cousin  would  now  pass 
under  your  charge  with  a  sincere  desire  for  reform ;  but  be- 
tween sincere  desire  and  steadfast  performance  there  is  a  long 
and  dreary  interval,  even  to  the  best  of  us.  Were  it  not  for 
Roland,  and  had  I  one  grain  less  confidence  in  you,  I  could 
not  entertain  the  thought  of  laying  on  your  young  shoulders 
so  great  a  responsibility.  But  every  new  responsibility  to  an 
earnest  nature  is  a  new  prop  to  virtue ;  and  all  I  now  ask  of 
you  is — to  remember  that  it  is  a  solemn  and  serious  charge, 
not  to  be  undertaken  without  the  most  deliberate  gauge  and 
measure  of  the  strength  with  which  it  is  to  be  borne. 

"  In  two  days  we  shall  be  in  London. — Yours,  my  Anachron- 
ism, anxiously  and  fondly,  A.  0." 

I  was  in  my  own  room  while  I  read  this  letter,  and  I  had 
just  finished  it  when,  as  I  looked  up,  I  saw  Roland  standing 
opposite  to  me.  "It  is  from  Austin,"  said  he;  then  he  paused 
a  moment,  and  added,  in  a  tone  that  seemed  quite  humble, 
"  May  I  see  it  ? — and  dare  I?"  I  placed  the  letter  in  his  hands, 
and  retired  a  few  paces,  that  he  might  not  think  I  watched  his 
countenance  while  he  read  it.     And  I  was  only  aware  that  he 


I  H)  THE   GAXTONS: 

had  come  to  ilic  end  by  a  heavy,  anxious, but  not  disappointed 
Bigh.  Then  I  turned,  and  our  eyes  met,  and  there  was  some- 
thing in  Roland's  look,  inquiring — and,  as  it  were,  imploring. 
I  interpreted  it  at  once. 

"Oh,  yes,  uncle,"  I  said,  smiling;  "I  have  reflected,  and  I 
have  no  fear  of  the  result.  Before  my  father  wrote,  what  he 
now  suggests  had  become  my  secret  wish.  As  for  our  other 
companions,  their  simple  natures  would  defy  all  such  sophis- 
tries as — but  he  is  already  half-cured  of  those.  Let  him  come 
with  me,  and  when  he  returns  he  shall  be  worthy  of  a  place 
in  your  heart,  beside  his  sister  Blanche.  I  feel,  I  promise  it — 
do  not  fear  for  me !  Such  a  change  will  be  a  talisman  to  my- 
self. I  will  shun  every  error  that  I  might  otherwise  commit, 
so  that  he  may  have  no  example  to  entice  him  to  err." 

I  know  that  in  youth,  and  the  superstition  of  first  love,  we 
are  credulously  inclined  to  believe  that  love,  and  the  possession 
of  the  beloved,  are  the  only  happiness.  But  when  my  uncle 
folded  me  in  his  arms,  and  called  me  the  hope  of  his  age,  and 
stay  of  his  house — the  music  of  my  father's  praise  still  ringing 
on  my  heart — I  do  affirm  that  I  knew  a  prouder  bliss  than  if 
Trevanion  had  placed  Fanny's  hand  in  mine,  and  said,  "  She 
is  yours." 

And  now  the  die  was  cast — the  decision  made.  It  was  with 
no  regret  that  I  wrote  to  Trevanion  to  decline  his  offers.  Nor 
was  the  sacrifice  so  great — even  putting  aside  the  natural  pride 
which  had  before  inclined  to  it — as  it  may  seem  to  some;  for, 
restless  though  I  was,  I  had  laboured  to  constrain  myself  to 
other  views  of  life  than  those  which  close  the  vistas  of  ambi- 
tion with  images  of  the  terrestrial  deities — Power  and  Bank. 
Had  I  not  been  behind  the  scenes,  noted  all  of  joy  and  of  peace 
that  the  pursuit  of  power  had  cost  Trevanion,  and  seen  how 
little  of  happiness  rank  gave  even  to  one  of  the  polished  habits 
and  graceful  attributes  of  Lord  Oastleton  ?  Yet  each  nature 
-  fined  lilted  so  well — the  first  for  power,  the  last  for  rank! 
I;  i-  marvellous  with  what  liberality  Providence  atones  for  the 
partial  dispensations  of  Fortune.  Independence,  or  the  vigor- 
ous pursuit  of  i1  ;  affection,  with  its  hopes  and  it^  rewards;  a 
life    only    rendered    by    Art    more    susceptible   to    Nature — in 

which  the  physical  enjoyments  are  pure  and  healthful — in 
which  the  mora]  faculties  expand  harmoniously  with  the  intel- 
lectual— and  the  heart  is  at  peace  with  the  mind;  is  this  a 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  441 

mean  lot  for  ambition  to  desire — and  is  it  so  far  ont  of  human 
reach  ?  "  Know  thyself,"  said  the  old  philosophy.  "  Improve 
thyself,"  saith  the  new.  The  great  object  of  the  Sojourner  in 
Time  is  not  to  waste  all  his  passions  and  gifts  on  the  things 
external,  that  he  must  leave  behind — that  which  he  cultivates 
within  is  all  that  he  can  carry  into  the  Eternal  Progress.  We 
are  here  but  as  schoolboys,  Avhose  life  begins  Avhere  school 
ends ;  and  the  battles  we  fought  with  our  rivals,  and  the  toys 
that  we  shared  with  our  playmates,  and  the  names  that  Ave 
carved,  high  or  low,  on  the  wall,  above  our  desks — will  they 
so  much  bestead  us  hereafter  ?  As  new  fates  crowd  ujmn  us, 
can  they  more  than  pass  through  the  memory  with  a  smile  or 
a  sigh  ?     Look  back  to  thy  school-days,  and  answer. 


CIiAPTER  XI. 

Two  weeks  since  the  date  of  the  preceding  chapter  have 
passed  ;  we  have  slept  our  last,  for  long  years  to  come,  on  the 
English  soil.  It  is  night — and  Vivian  has  been  admitted  to  an 
interview  with  his  father.  They  have  been  together  alone  an 
hour  and  more,  and  I  and  my  father  will  not  disturb  them. 
But  the  clock  strikes — the  hour  is  late — the  ship  sails  to-night 
— we  should  be  on  board.  And  as  we  two  stand  below,  the 
door  opens  in  the  room  above,  and  a  heavy  step  descends  the 
stairs ;  the  father  is  leaning  on  the  son's  arm.  You  should  see 
how  timidly  the  son  guides  the  halting  step.  And  now  as  the 
light  gleams  on  their  faces,  there  are  tears  on  Vivian's  cheek  : 
but  the  face  of  Roland  seems  calm  and  happy.  Happy !  when 
about  to  be  separated,  perhaps  for  ever,  from  his  son  ?  Yes, 
happy,  because  he  has  found  a  son  for  the  first  time ;  and  is 
not  thinking  of  years  and  absence,  and  the  chance  of  death — 
but  thankful  for  the  Divine  Mercy,  and  cherishing  celestial 
hope.  If  ye  wonder  why  Roland  is  happy  in  such  an  hour, 
how  vainly  have  I  sought  to  make  him  breathe,  and  live,  and 
move  before  you ! 

We  are  on  board ;  our  luggage  all  went  first.  I  had  had 
time,  with  the  help  of  a  carpenter,  to  knock  up  cabins  for  Viv- 
ian, Guy  Bolding,  and  myself,  in  the  hold.  For,  thinking  we 
could  not  too  soon  lav  aside  the  pretensions  of  Europe — "  de- 

T2 


mi;   (  \\io\s. 

fine-gentlemanize"  ourselves,  as  Trevanion  recommended — we 
had  engaged  Bteerage  passage,  to  the  great  humouring  of  our 
finances.     We  had,  too,  the  luxury  to  be  by  ourselves,  and  our 

own  Cumberland  folks  were  round  us,  as  our  friends  and  serv- 
ants both. 

We  are  on  board,  and  have  looked  our  last  on  those  Ave  are 
to  leave,  and  we  stand  on  deck  leaning  on  each  other.  We  are 
on  board,  and  the  lights,  near  and  far,  shine  from  the  vast  City; 
and  the  stars  are  on  high,  bright  and  clear,  as  for  the  first  mar- 
iners of  old.  Strange  noises,  rough  voices,  and  crackling  cords, 
and  here  and  there  the  sobs  of  women,  mingling  with  the  oaths 
of  men.  Now  the  swing  and  heave  of  the  vessel — the  dreary 
sense  of  exile  that  comes  when  the  ship  fairly  moves  over  the 
waters.  And  still  we  stood,  and  looked,  and  listened ;  silent, 
and  leaning  on  each  other. 

Night  deepened,  the  City  vanished — not  a  gleam  from  its 
myriad  lights !  The  river  widened  and  widened.  How  cold 
comes  the  wind ! — is  that  a  gale  from  the  sea  ?  The  stars  grow 
faint — the  moon  has  sunk.  And  now  how  desolate  seem  the 
waters  in  the  comfortless  gray  of  dawn !  Then  we  shivered 
and  looked  at  each  other,  and  muttered  something  that  was 
not  the  thought  deepest  at  our  hearts,  ana  crept  into  our  berths 
— feeling  sure  it  was  not  for  sleep.  And  sleep  came  on  us,  soft 
and  kind.     The  ocean  lulled  the  exiles  as  on  a  mother's  breast. 


PAET  SEVENTEENTH. 

CHAPTER  I. 

The  stage-scene  has  dropped.  Settle  yourselves,  my  good 
audience ;  chat  each  with  his  neighbour.  Dear  madam,  hi  the 
boxes,  take  up  your  opera-glass  and  look  about  you.  Treat 
Tom  and  pretty  Sal  to  some  of  those  fine  oranges,  O  thou  hap- 
py-looking mother  in  the  two-shilling  gallery!  Yes,  brave 
'prentice  boys,  in  the  tier  above,  the  cat-call  by  all  means ! 
And  you,  "  most  potent,  grave,  and  reverend  seigneurs,"  in  the 
front  row  of  the  pit — practised  critics  and  steady  old  play-go- 
ers—  who  shake  your  heads  at  new  actors  and  playwrights, 
and,  true  to  the  creed  of  your  youth  (for  the  which  all  honour 
to  you!), firmly  believe  that  we  are  shorter  by  the  head  than 
those  giants  our  grandfathers — laugh  or  scold  as  you  will, 
while  the  drop-scene  still  shuts  out  the  stage.  It  is  just  that 
you  should  all  amuse  yourselves  in  your  own  way,  O  specta- 
tors !  for  the  interval  is  long.  All  the  actors  have  to  change 
their  dresses ;  all  the  scene-shifters  are  at  work,  sliding  the 
"  sides"  of  a  new  world  into  their  grooves ;  and  in  high  dis- 
dain of  all  unity  of  time,  as  of  place,  you  will  see  in  the  play- 
bills that  there  is  a  great  demand  on  your  belief.  You  are 
called  upon  to  suppose  that  we  are  older  by  five  years  than 
when  you  last  saw  us  "  fret  our  hour  upon  the  stage."  Five 
years !  the  author  tells  us  especially  to  humour  the  belief  by 
letting  the  drop-scene  linger  longer  than  usual  between  the 
lamps  and  the  stage. 

Play  up  !  O  ye  fiddles  and  kettle-drums  !  the  time  is  elapsed. 
Stop  that  cat-call,  young  gentleman ! — heads  down  in  the  pit 
there !  Now  the  flourish  is  over — the  scene  draws  up :  look 
before! 

A  bright,  clear,  transparent  atmosphere — bright  as  that  of 
the  East,  but  vigorous  and  bracing  as  the  air  of  the  North ;  a 
broad  and  fair  river,  rolling  through  wide  grassy  plains ;  yon- 
der, far  in  the  distance,  stretch  away  vast  forests  of  evergreen, 
and  gentle  slopes  break  the  line  of  the  cloudless  horizon;  see 


\  14  Tin-:  i  \xn>\>  : 

the  pastures,  Arcadian  with  sheep  in  hundreds  and  thousands 
— Tim-sis  and  Menalcai  would  have  had  hard  labour  to  count 
them,  and  small  time,  I  fear,  for  singing  songs  about  Daphne. 

But, alas!  Daphnes  are  rare;  no  nymphs  with  garlands  and 
crooks  trip  over  those  pastures. 

Turn  your  eyes  to  the  right,  nearer  the  river;  just  parted 
by  a  low  fence  from  the  thirty  acres  or  so  that  are  farmed  for 
amusement  or  convenience,  not  for  profit — that  comes  from  the 
sheep — you  catch  a  glimpse  of  a  garden.  Look  not  so  scorn- 
fully at  the  primitive  horticulture — such  gardens  are  rare  in  the 
Bush.  I  doubt  if  the  stately  King  of  the  Peak  ever  more  re- 
joiced in  the  famous  conservatory,  through  which  you  may 
drive  in  your  carriage,  than  do  the  sons  of  the  Bush  in  the 
herbs  and  blossoms  which  taste  and  breathe  of  the  old  father- 
land. Go  on,  and  behold  the  palace  of  the  patriarchs — it  is  of 
wood,  I  grant  you,  but  the  house  we  build  with  our  own  hands 
is  always  a  palace.  Did  you  ever  build  one  when  you  were  a 
1  »<  >y  ?  And  the  lords  of  that  palace  are  lords  of  the  land,  al- 
most as  Kir  as  you  can  see,  and  of  those  numberless  flocks  ;  and 
better  still,  of  a  health  which  an  antediluvian  might  have  en- 
vied, and  of  nerves  so  seasoned  with  horse-breaking,  cattle- 
driving,  fighting  with  wild  blacks — chases  from  them  and  after 
them,  for  life  and  for  death — that  if  any  passion  vex  the  breast 
of  those  kings  of  the  Bushland,  fear  at  least  is  erased  from  the 
list. 

See  here  and  there  through  the  landscape,  rude  huts  like  the 
masters' — wild  spirits  and  fierce  dwell  within.  But  they  are 
tamed  into  order  by  plenty  and  hope ;  by  the  hand  open  but 
firm,  by  the  eye  keen  but  just. 

Now,  out  from  those  woods,  over  those  green  rolling  plains, 
harum-scarum,  helter-skelter,  long  hair  flying  wild,  and  all 
bearded,  as  a  Turk  or  a  pard,  comes  a  rider  you  recognize. 
The  rider  dismounts,  and  another  old  acquaintance  turns  from 
:i  shepherd,  with  whom  he  has  been  conversing  on  matters 
that  never  plagued  Thyrsis  and  Menalcas,  whose  sheep  seem 
to  have  been  innocent  of  foot-rot  and  scab — and  accosts  the 
horseman. 

PlSlSTRATUS. — "My  dear  Guy,  where  on  earth  have  you 
been?" 

(h  v  (producing  a  book  from  his  pocket,  with  great  tri- 
umph).— "There!    Dr.  Johnson's  Lin  a  of  the  Ports.      I  could 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  445 

not  get  the  squatter  to  let  me  have  Kenilworth,  though  I  of- 
fered him  three  sheep  for  it.  Dull  old  fellow,  that  Dr.  John- 
son, I  suspect ;  so  much  the  better,  the  book  will  last  all  the 
longer.  And  here's  a  Sydney  paper,  too,  only  two  months 
old !"  (Guy  takes  a  short  pipe,  or  dodeen,  from  his  hat,  in  the 
band  of  which  it  had  been  stuck,  fills  and  lights  it.) 

Pisisteatus. — "You  must  have  ridden  thirty  miles  at  the 
least.     To  think  of  your  turning  book-hunter,  Guy  !" 

Guy  Boldixg  (philosophically). — "Ay,  one  don't  know  the 
worth  of  a  thing  till  one  has  lost  it.  No  sneers  at  me,  old  fel- 
low ;  you,  too,  declared  that  you  were  bothered  out  of  your 
life  by  those  books,  till  you  found  how  long  the  evenings  were 
without  them.  Then,  the  first  new  book  we  got — an  old  volume 
of  the  spectator  I — such  fun  !" 

Pisisteatus. — "  Very  true.  The  brown  cow  has  calved  in 
your  absence.  Do  you  know,  Guy,  I  think  we  shall  have  no 
scab  in  the  fold  this  year.  If  so,  there  will  be  a  rare  sum  to 
lay  by !     Things  look  up  with  us  now,  Guy." 

Gi"Y  Boldixg. — "  Yes !  Very  different  from  the  first  two 
years.  You  drew  a  long  face  then.  How  Avise  you  were,  to 
insist  on  our  learning  experience  at  another  man's  station  be- 
fore we  hazarded  our  own  capital !  But,  by  Jove  !  those  sheep, 
at  first,  were  enough  to  plague  a  man  out  of  his  wits.  What 
with  the  wild  dogs,  just  as  the  sheep  had  been  washed  and 
ready  to  shear ;  then  that  cursed  scabby  sheep  of  Joe  Tini- 
mes's,  that  we  caught  rubbing  his  sides  so  complacently  against 
our  unsuspecting  poor  ewes.  I  wonder  we  did  not  rim  away. 
But  ' '•  Patient ia  jW — what  is  that  line  in  Horace  ?  Never  mind 
now.  '  It  is  a  long  lane  that  has  no  turning'  does  just  as  well 
as  anything  in  Horace,  and  Virgil  to  boot.  I  say,  has  not  Vivian 
been  here  ?" 

Pisisteatus. — "  No ;  but  he  will  be  sure  to  come  to-day." 

Guy  Boldixg. — "  He  has  much  the  best  berth  of  it.  Horse- 
breeding  and  cattle-feeding ;  galloping  after  those  wild  devils ; 
lost  in  a  forest  of  horns ;  beasts  lowing,  scampering,  goring, 
tearing  off  like  mad  buffaloes ;  horses  galloping  up  hill,  down 
hill,  over  rocks,  stones,  and  timber ;  whips  cracking,  men  shout- 
ing— your  neck  all  but  broken ;  a  great  bull  making  at  you  full 
rush.  Such  fun !  Sheep  are  dull  things  to  look  at  after  a  bull- 
hunt  and  a  cattle-feast." 

Pisisteatus. — "  Every  man  to  his  taste  in  the  bush.     One 


4  It)  THE    I  1XT0NS  ! 

may  make  one's  money  more  easily  and  safely,  with  more  ad- 
venture and  Bport,  in  the  bucolic  department.  But  one  makes 
larger  profit  and  quicker  fortune,  with  good  luck  and  good 
care,  in  the  pastoral — and  our  object,  I  take  it,  is  to  get  Lack 
to  England  as  soon  as  we  can." 

Gut  Bolding. — "Humph!  I  should  be  content  to  live  and 
die  in  the  Bush — nothing  like  it,  if  women  were  not  so  scarce. 
To  think  of  the  redundant  spinster  population  at  home,  and 
not  a  spinster  here  to  be  seen  within  thirty  miles,  save  Bet 
Goggins,  indeed — and  she  has  only  one  eye!  But  to  return  to 
Vivian — why  should  it  be  our  object,  more  than  his,  to  get  back 
to  England  as  soon  as  we  can  ?"" 

Pisistratus. — "  Not  more,  certainly.  But  you  saw  that  an 
excitement  more  stirring  than  that  we  find  in  the  sheep  had 
become  necessary  to  him.  You  know  he  was  growing  dull 
and  dejected  ;  the  cattle  station  was  to  be  sold  a  bargain. 
And  then  the  Durham  bulls,  and  the  Yorkshire  horses,  which 
Mr.  Trevanion  sent  you  and  me  out  as  presents,  were  so  tempt- 
ing. I  thought  we  might  fairly  add  one  speculation  to  another; 
and  since  one  of  us  must  superintend  the  bucolics,  and  two  of 
us  were  required  for  the  pastorals,  I  think  Vivian  was  the  best 
of  us  three  to  intrust  with  the  first ;  and  certainly  it  has  suc- 
ceeded as  yet." 

Guy. — "  Why,  yes,  Vivian  is  quite  in  his  element — always 
in  action,  and  always  in  command.  Let  him  be  first  in  every- 
thing, and  there  is  not  a  finer  fellow,  nor  a  better  tempered — 
present  company  excepted.  Hark !  the  dogs,  the  crack  of  the 
whip ;  there  he  is.  And  now,  I  suppose,  we  may  go  to  din- 
ner." 

Enter  Vivian. 

His  frame  lias  grown  more  athletic;  his  eye,  more  steadfast 
and  less  restless,  looks  you  full  in  the  face.  His  smile  is  more 
<»]»cn  ;  but  there  is  a  melancholy  in  his  expression,  almost  ap- 
proaching to  gloom.  His  dress  is  the  same  as  that  of  Pisistra- 
tus and  Guy — white  vest  and  trousers  ;  loose  neckcloth,  rather 
gay  in  colour;  broad  cabbage-leaf  hat ;  his  moustache  and 
beard  arc  trimmed  with  more  care  than  ours.  He  lias  a  large 
whip  in  his  hand,  and  a  gun  slung  across  his  shoulders.  Greet- 
ings are  exchanged  ;  mutual  inquiries  as  to  the  cattle  and  sheep, 
and  the  last  horses  despatched  to  the  Indian  market.  Guy 
shows  the  Tdves  of  the  Poets  :  Vivian  asks  if  it  is  possible  to 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  447 

get  the  Life  of  Clive,  or  Napoleon,  or  a  copy  -of  Plutarch. 
Guy  shakes  his  head — says,  if  a  Robinson  Crusoe  will  do  as 
well,  he  has  seen  one  in  a  very  tattered  state,  but  in  too  great 
request  to  be  had  a  bargain. 

The  party  turn  into  the  hut.  Miserable  animals  are  bache- 
lors iu  all  countries  ;  but  most  miserable  in  Bushland.  A  man 
does  not  know  what  a  helpmate  of  the  softer  sex  is  in  the  Old 
World,  where  women  seem  a  matter  of  course.  But  in  the 
Bush,  a  wife  is  literally  bone  of  your  bone,  flesh  of  your  flesh 
— your  better  half,  your  ministering  angel,  your  Eve  of  the 
Eden — in  short,  all  that  poets  have  sung,  or  young  orators  say 
at  public  dinners,  when  called  upon  to  give  the  toast  of  "  The 
Ladies."  Alas  !  we  are  three  bachelors,  but  we  are  better  off 
than  bachelors  often  are  in  the  Bush.  For  the  wife  of  the 
shepherd  I  took  from  Cumberland  does  me  and  Bolding  the 
honour  to  live  in  our  hut,  and  make  things  tidy  and  comfort- 
able. She  has  had  a  couple  of  children  since  we  have  been  in 
the  Bush  ;  a  wing  has  been  added  to  the  hut  for  that  increase 
of  family.  The  children,  I  dare  say,  one  might  have  thought  a 
sad  nuisance  in  England;  but  I  declare  that,  surrounded  as 
one  is  by  great  bearded  men,  from  sunrise  to  sunset,  there  is 
something  humanizing,  musical,  and  Christian-like  in  the  very 
squall  of  the  baby.  There  it  goes — bless  it !  As  for  my  other 
companions  from  Cumberland,  Miles  Square,  the  most  aspiring 
of  all,  has  long  left  me,  and  is  superintendent  to  a  great  sheep- 
owner  some  two  hundred  miles  off.  The  Will-o'-the-Wisp  is 
consigned  to  the  cattle  station,  where  he  is  Vivian's  head  man, 
finding  time  now  and  then  to  indulge  his  old  poaching  pro- 
pensities at  the' expense  of  parrots,  black  cockatoos,  pigeons, 
and  kangaroos.  The  shepherd  remains  with  us,  and  does  not 
seem,  honest  fellow,  to  care  to  better  himself;  he  has  a  feeling 
of  clanship,  which  keeps  down  the  ambition  common  in  Aus- 
tralia. And  his.  wife — such  a  treasure!  I  assure  you,  the 
sight  of  her  smooth,  smiling  woman's  face,  when  we  return 
home  at  nightfall,  and  the  very  flow  of  her  gown,  as  she  turns 
the  "  dampers"*  in  the  ashes,  and  fills  the  teapot,  have  in  them 
something  holy  and  angelical.  How  lucky  our  Cumberland 
swain  is  not  jealous !  Xot  that  there  is  any  cause,  enviable 
dog  though  he  be ;  but  where  Desdemonas  are  so  scarce,  if 
you  could  but  guess  how  green-eyed  their  Othellos  generally 
*  A  damper  is  a  cake  of  flour  baked  without  yeast,  in  the  ashes. 


448  im-   CAXT0N8  : 

arel  Excellent  husbands,  it  is  true — none  better;  but  you 
had  Letter  think  twice  before  you  attempt  to  play  the  Cassio 
in  Bushland!  There, however, she  Ls,dear  creature! — rattling 
among  knives  and  forks,  smoothing  the  table-cloth,  setting  on 
the  salt-beef,  and  that  rare  Luxury  of  pickles  (the  last  pot  in 
our  store),  and  the  produce  of  our  garden  and  poultry-yard, 
which  few  Bushmen  can  boast  of — and  the  dampers,  and  a  pot 
of  tea  to  each  banqueter  ;  rib  wine,  beer,  nor  spirits — those  are 
only  for  shearing-time.  We  have  just  said  grace  (a  fashion  re- 
tained from  the  holy  mother-country),  when,  bless  my  soul! 
what  a  clatter  without,  what  a  tramping  of  feet,  what  a  bark- 
ing of  dogs!  Some  guests  have  arrived.  They  are  always 
welcome  in  Bushland !  Perhaps  a  cattle-buyer  in  search  of 
Vivian  ;  perhaps  that  cursed  squatter,  whose  sheep  are  always 
migrating  to  ours.  Never  mind,  a  hearty  welcome  to  all — 
friend  or  foe.  The  door  opens ;  one,  two,  three  strangers. 
More  plates  and  knives  ;  draw  your  stools ;  just  in  time.  First 
eat,  then — what  news? 

Just  as  the  strangers  sit  down,  a  voice  is  heard  at  the  door — 

"  You  will  take  particular  care  of  this  horse,  young  man : 
walk  him  about  a  little;  wash  his  back  with  salt  and  water. 
Just  unbuckle  the  saddle-bags;  give  them  to  me.  Oh!  safe 
enough,  I  dare  say — but  papers  of  consequence.  The  ]u*os- 
perity  of  the  colony  depends  on  these  papers.  What  would 
become  of  you  all  if  any  accident  happened  to  them,  I  shudder 
to  think." 

And  here,  attired  in  a  twill  shooting-jacket,  budding  with 
gilt  buttons,  impressed  with  a  well-remembered  device  ;  a  eab- 
bage-leaf  hat  shading  a  nice  rarely  seen  in  the  Bush — a  face 
smooth  as  razor  could  make  it:  neat,  trim,  respectable-looking 
as  ever — his  arm  full  of  saddle-bags,  and  his  nostrils  gently  dis- 
tended,  inhaling  the  steam  of  the  banquet,  Walks  in — Uncle  Jack. 

Pimstkatus  (leaping  up). — uIs  it  possible?  Ybu  in  Aus- 
tralia— you  "m  the  Bush  !" 

Uncle  Jack,  not  recognizing  Pisistratus  in  the  tall,  bearded 
man  who  is  making  a  plunge  at  him,  recedes  in  alarm,  exclaim- 
ing— "  Who  arc  you? — never  saw  you  before,  sir!  I  suppose 
you'll  say  next  that  Towt  you  *<>)>i<  thing /" 

Pisistratus. — "  Uncle  .lack  !" 

I'\<  1.1:  Jack  (dropping  liis  saddle-bags).  —  "Nephew!  — 
Heaven  !»<■  praised  I     Conn!  to  my  arms!" 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  449 

They  embrace ;  mutual  introductions  to  the  company — Mr. 
Vivian,  Mr.  Bolding,  on  the  one  side — Major  MacBlarney,  Mr. 
Bullion,  Mr.  Emanuel  Speck,  on  the  other.  Major  MacBlarney 
is  a  fine  portly  man,  with  a  slight  Dublin  brogue,  who  squeezes 
your  hand  as  he  would  a  sponge.  Mr.  Bullion — reserved  and 
haughty — wears  green  spectacles,  and  gives  you  a  fore-finger. 
Mr.  Emanuel  Speck — unusually  smart  for  the  Bush,  with  a  blue 
satin  stock,  and  one  of  those  blouses  common  in  Germany,  with 
elaborate  hems,  and  pockets  enough  for  Briareus  to  have  put 
all  his  hands  into  at  once — is  thin,  civil,  and  stoops — bows, 
smiles,  and  sits  down  to  dinner  again,  with  the  air  of  a  man 
accustomed  to  attend  to  the  main  chance. 

Uncle  Jack  (his  mouth  full  of  beef).  —  "Famous  beef! 
breed  it  yourself,  eh  ?  Slow  work  that  cattle-feeding !" — (Emp- 
ties the  rest  of  the  pickle-jar  into  his  plate.)  "  Must  learn  to 
go  ahead  in  the  New  World — railway  times  these  !  We  can 
put  him  up  to  a  thing  or  two — eh,  Bullion  ?"  (Whispering  me) 
— "  Great  capitalist  that  Bullion !  look  at  him  !" 

Mr.  Bullion  (gravely). — "  A  thing  or  two !  If  he  has  cap- 
ital— you  have  said  it,  Mr.  Tibbets."  (Looks  round  for  the 
pickles — the  green  spectacles  remain  fixed  upon  Uncle  Jack's 
plate.) 

Uncle  Jack. — "  All  that  this  colony  wants  is  a  few  men  like 
us,  with  capital  and  spirit.  Instead  of  paying  paupers  to  emi- 
grate, they  should  pay  rich  men  to  come — eh,  Speck  ?" 

While  Uncle  Jack  turns  to  Mr.  Speck,  Mr.  Bullion  fixes  his 
fork  in  a  pickled  onion  in  Jack's  plate,  and  transfers  it  to  his 
own — observing,  not  as  incidentally  to  the  onion,  but  to  truth 
in  general — "  A  man,  gentlemen,  in  this  country,  has  only  to 
keep  his  eyes  on  the  look-out,  and  seize  on  the  first  advantage ! 
— resources  are  incalculable !" 

Uncle  Jack,  returning  to  the  plate  and  missing  the  onion, 
forestalls  Mr.  Speck  in  seizing  the  last  potato — observing  also, 
and  in  the  same  philosophical  and  generalizing  spirit  as  Mr. 
Bullion — "  The  great  thing  in  this  country  is  to  be  always  be- 
forehand :  discovery  and  invention,  promptitude  and  decision ! 
— that's  your  go.  'Pon  my  life,  one  picks  up  sad  vulgar  say- 
ings among  the  natives  here  ! — '  that's  your  go  !'  shocking  ! 
What  would  your  poor  father  say  ?  How  is  he — good  Aus- 
tin ?  Well?— that's  right:  and  my  dear  sister?  Ah,  that 
damnable  Peck!  —  still  harping  on  the  Anti- Capitalist,  eh? 


450  THE   CAXTONS  : 

Bat  I  Ml  make  it  up  to  you  all  now.     Gentlemen,  charge  your 
glasses — a  bumper  toast." 

Mr.  Specb  (in  an  affected  lone). — "I  respond  to  the  senti- 
ment in  a  flowing  cup.     Glasses  are  not  forthcoming." 

I'  \.  lb  .1  \<  k. — "  A  bumper-toast  to  the  health  of  the  future 
millionaire,  whom  I  present  to  you  in  my  nephew  and  sole  heir 
—  Pisistratus  Caxton,  Esq.  Yes,  gentlemen,  I  here  publicly 
announce  to  you  that  this  gentleman  will  be  the  inheritor  of 
all  my  wealth — freehold,  leasehold,  agricultural,  and  mineral ; 
and  when  I  am  in  the  cold  grave" — (takes  out  his  pocket-hand- 
kerchief)— "  and  nothing  remains  of  poor  John  Tibbets,  look 
upon  that  gentleman  and  say,  'John  Tibbets  lives  again  !'  " 

Me.  Speck  (ehantingly). — 

"  'Let  the  bumper-toast  go  round  !'  " 

Guy  Boldixg. — "Hip,  hip,  hurrah  ! — three  times  three! 
What  fun !" 

Order  is  restored ;  dinner-things  are  cleared ;  each  gentle- 
man lights  his  pipe. 

Vivian. — "  What  news  from  England  ?" 

Mr.  Bullion. — "  As  to  the  funds,  sir  ?" 

Mb.  Speck. — "I  suppose  you  mean,  rather,  as  to  the  rail- 
ways :  great  fortunes  will  be  made  there,  sir ;  but  still  I  think 
that  our  speculations  here  will — " 

Vivian. — "I  beg  pardon  for  interrupting  you,  sir;  but  I 
thought,  in  the  last  papers,  that  there  seemed  something  hostile 
in  the  temper  of  the  French.     No  chance  of  a  war?" 

Majoe  MacBlaexey. — "  Is  it  the  war  you'd  be  after,  young 
gintleman  ?  If  me  interest  at  the  Horse  Guards  can  avail 
you,  bedad  !  you'd  make  a  proud  man  of  Major  MacBlarney." 

.Mi:.  Bullion  (authoritatively). — "No,  sir,  we  won't  have  a 
war  :  the  capitalists  of  Europe  and  Australia  won't  have  it. 
The  Rothschilds,  and  a  few  others  that  shall  be  nameless,  have 
only  got  to  do  this,  sir" — (Mr.  Bullion  buttons  up  his  pockets) 
— "and  we'll  do  it  too;  and  then  what  becomes  of  your  war, 
Bir?"  (Mr.  Bullion  snaps  his  pipe  in  the  vehemence  with 
which  he  brings  his  hand  on  the  table,  turns  round  his  green 
spectacles,  and  takes  ap  .Mr.  Speck's  pipe,  which  that  gentle- 
man had  laid  aside  in  an  unguarded  moment.) 

Vivian. — k*  But  the  campaign  in  India?" 

Majoe  MacBlabnet.  —  "Ohl  —  and  if  it's  the  Ingees 
you'd—" 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  451 

Mr.  Bullion  (refilling  Speck's  pipe  from  Guy  Bolding's  ex- 
clusive tobacco-pouch,  and  interrupting  the  Major). — "  India — 
that's  another  matter :  I  don't  object  to  that !  War  there — 
rather  good  for  the  money-market  than  otherwise !" 

Yiviax. — "  What  news  there,  then  ?" 

Me.  Bulliox. — "  Don't  know — haven't  got  India  stock." 

Me.  Speck. — "Nor  I  either.  The  day  for  India  is  over: 
this  is  our  India  now."  (Misses  his  tobacco-pipe ;  sees  it  in 
Bullion's  mouth,  and  stares  aghast ! — N.B.  The  pipe  is  not  a 
clay  dodeen,hxit  a  small  meerschaum  —  irreplaceable  in  Bush- 
land.) 

Pisisteatus. — "  Well,  uncle,  but  I  am  at  a  loss  to  under- 
stand what  new  scheme  you  have  in  hand.  Something  benev- 
olent, I  am  sure — something  for  your  fellow-creatures — for 
philanthropy  and  mankind  ?" 

Me.  Bulliox  (starting). — "Why,  young  man,  are  you  as 
green  as  all  that  ?" 

Pisisteatus.  —  "  I,  sir  —  no  —  Heaven  forbid  !  But  my — " 
(Uncle  Jack  holds  up  his  finger  imploringly,  and  spills  his  tea 
over  the  pantaloons  of  his  nephew !) 

Pisistratus,  wroth  at  the  efiect  of  the  tea,  and  therefore  ob- 
durate to  the  sign  of  the  forefinger,  continues  rapidly,  "  But 
my  uncle  is  f — some  Grand  Xational-Imperial-Colonial- Anti- 
Monopoly — " 

Uxcle  Jack. — "  Pooh  !  pooh  !     What  a  droll  boy  it  is !" 

Me.  Bulliox  (solemnly). — "With  these  notions,  which  not 
even  in  jest  should  be  fathered  on  my  respectable  and  intelli- 
gent friend  here" — (Uncle  Jack  bows) — "  I  am  afraid  you  will 
never  get  on  in  the  world,  Mr.  Caxton.  I  don't  think  our  spec- 
ulations will  suit  you  f  It, is  growing  late,  gentlemen  :  we 
must  push  on." 

Uxcle  Jack  (jumping  up). — "And  I  have  so  much  to  say 
to  the  dear  boy.  Excuse  me :  you  know  the  feelings  of  an 
uncle  !"     (Takes  my  arm,  and  leads  me  out  of  the  hut.) 

Uxcle  Jack  (as  soon  as  we  are  in  the  air). — "You'll  ruin 
us — you,  me,  and  your  father  and  mother.  Yes !  What  do 
you  think  I  work  and  slave  myself  for  but  for  you  and  yours  ? 
Ruin  us  all,  I  say,  if  you  talk  in  that  way  before  Bullion  !  His 
heart  is  as  hard  as  the  Bank  of  England.' s — and  quite  right  he 
is,  too.  Fellow-creatures! — stuff!  I  have  renounced  that  de- 
lusion— the  generous  follies  of  my  youth  !     I  begin  at  last  to 


452  1  III.    t'AX  lo.Ns  ; 

live  for  myself— that  is,  for  self  and  relatives!  I  shall  succeed 
this  time,  you'll  see  I" 

PlSISTRATUS. — "Indeed,  uncle,  I  hope  so  sincerely;   and,  to 

do  you  justice,  there  is  always  something  very  clever  in  your 
ideas — only  they  don't — " 

Uncle  Jack  (interrupting  me  with  a  groan).  —  "The  for- 
tunes that  other  men  have  gained  by  my  ideas ! — shocking  to 
think  of!  What  ! — and  shall  I  be  reproached  if  I  live  no 
longer  for  such  a  set  of  thieving,  greedy,  ungrateful  knaves? 
No,  no  !  Number  One  shall  be  my  maxim ;  and  I'll  make  you 
a  Croesus,  my  boy — I  will." 

Pisistratus,  after  grateful  acknowledgments  for  all  prospect- 
ive benefits,  inquires  how  long  Jack  has  been  in  Australia; 
what  brought  him  into  the  colony  ;  and  what  are  his  present 
a iews.  Learns,  to  his  astonishment,  that  Uncle  Jack  has  been 
four  years  in  the  colony ;  that  he  sailed  the  year  after  Pisis- 
tratus— induced,  he  says,  by  that  illustrious  example,  and  by 
some  mysterious  agency  or  commission,  which  he  will  not  ex- 
plain, emanating  either  from  the  Colonial  Office,  or  an  Emigra- 
tion Company.  Uncle  Jack  has  been  thriving  wonderfully 
since  he  abandoned  his  fellow-creatures.  His  first  speculation, 
on  arriving  at  the  colony,  was  in  buying  some  houses  in  Syd- 
ney, which  (by  those  fluctuations  in  prices  common  to  the  ex- 
tremes of  the  colonial  mind — which  is  one  while  skipping  up 
the  rainbow  with  Hope,  and  at  another  plunging  into  Ache- 
rontian  abysses  with  Despair)  he  bought  excessively  cheap, 
and  sold  excessively  dear.  But  his  grand  experiment  has 
been  in  connection  with  the  infant  settlement  of  Adelaide,  of 
which  he  considers  himself  one  of  the  first  founders  ;  and  as,  in 
the  rush  of  emigration  which  poured  to  that  favoured  estab- 
lishment in  the  earlier  years  of  its  existence, — rolling  on  its 
tide  all  manner  of  credulous  and  inexperienced  adventurers, — 
vast  sums  were  lost,  so,  of  those  sums,  certain  fragments  and 
pickings  were  easily  griped  and  gathered  up  by  a  man  of  Un- 
cle .lark's  readiness  and  dexterity.  Tiicle  Jack  had  contrived 
to  procure  excellent  letters  of  introduction  to  the  colonial 
grandees:  he  got  into  close  connection  with  some  of  the  prin- 
cipal parties  seeking  to  est:il>lish  a  monopoly  of  land  (which 
has  since  been  in  great  measure  effected,  by  raising  the  price, 

and  excluding  the  small  fry  of  petty  capitalists)  ;  and  effectu- 
ally imposed  on  them,  as  a  man  with  avast  knowledge  of  pub- 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  453 

lie  business — in  the  confidence  of  great  men  at  home — consid- 
erable influence  with  the  English  press,  <fcc.,  &c.  And  no  dis- 
credit to  their  discernment ;  for  Jack,  when  he  pleased,  had  a 
Way  with  him  that  was  almost  irresistible.  In  this  manner  he 
contrived  to  associate  himself  and  his  earnings  with  men  really 
of  large  capital,  and  long  practical  experience  in  the  best  mode 
by  which  that  capital  might  be  employed.  He  was  thus  ad- 
mitted into  a  partnership  (so  far  as  his  means  went)  with  Mr. 
Bullion,  who  was  one  of  the  largest  sheep-owners  and  land- 
holders in  the  colony ;  though,  having  many  other  nests  to 
feather,  that  gentleman  resided  in  state  at  Sydney,  and  left  his 
runs  and  stations  to  the  care  of  overseers  and  superintendents. 
But  land-jobbing  was  Jack's  special  delight ;  and  an  ingenious 
German  having  lately  declared  that  the  neighbourhood  of  Ade- 
laide betrayed  the  existence  of  those  mineral  treasures  which 
have  since  been  brought  to  day,  Mr.  Tibbetts  had  persuaded 
Bullion  and  the  other  gentlemen  now  accompanying  him,  to 
undertake  the  land  journey  from  Sydney  to  Adelaide,  privily 
and  quietly,  to  ascertain  the  truth  of  the  German's  report, 
which  was  at  present  very  little  believed.  If  the  ground  fail- 
ed of  mines,  Uncle  Jack's  account  convinced  his  associates 
that  mines  quite  as  profitable  might  be  found  in  the  pockets 
of  the  raw  adventurers,  who  were  ready  to  buy  one  year  at 
the  dearest  market,  and  driven  to  sell  the  next  at  the  cheapest. 

"  But,"  concluded  Uncle  Jack,  with  a  sly  look,  and  giving 
me  a  poke  in  the  ribs,  "  I've  had  to  do  with  mines  before  now, 
and  know  what  they  are.  I'll  let  nobody  but  you  into  my  pet 
scheme ;  you  shall  go  shares  if  you  like.  The  scheme  is  as 
plain  as  a  problem  in  Euclid, — if  the  German  is  right,  and  there 
are  mines,  why,  the  mines  will  be  worked.  Then  miners  must 
be  employed ;  but  miners  must  eat,  drink,  and  spend  their 
money.     The  thing  is  to  get  that  money.     Do  you  take  ?" 

Pisistratus. — "  Not  at  all !" 

Uncle  Jack  (majestically). — "A  Great  Grog  and  Store  De- 
pot !  The  miners  want  grog  and  stores,  come  to  your  depot ; 
you  take  their  money  ;  Q.E.D. !  Shares — eh,  you  dog  ?  Cribs, 
as  we  said  at  school.  Put  in  a  paltry  thousand  or  two,  and 
you  shall  go  halves." 

Pisistratus  (vehemently). — "  Not  for  all  the  mines  of  Po- 
tosi." 

Uncle  Jack  (good-humouredly). — "Well,  it  sha'n't  be  the 


454  -  rHJB  CAXTONS: 

worse  for  you.  I  Bha'n'l  alter  my  will,  iu  spite  of  your  want  of 
confidence.  5Tour  young  friend — that  Mr.Vivian,  I  think  you 
call  him  —  intelligent-looking  fellow,  sharper  than  the  other,  I 
guess, — would  hi  like  a  share?" 

Pisisteatus. — "In  the  grog  depot?  You  had  better  ask 
him!" 

I '  n<  li:  Jack. — "  What !  you  pretend  to  be  aristocratic  in  the 
Bush!  Too  good.  Ha,  ha — they're  calling  to  me — we  must 
be  off." 

Pisistuati's. — "  I  will  ride  with  you  a  few  miles.  What 
bay  you,Yivian  ?  and  you,  Guy  ?" — 

As  the  whole  party  now  joined  us. 

Guy  prefers  basking  in  the  sun,  and  reading  the  Lives  of  the 
Poets.  Vivian  assents  ;  Ave  accompany  the  party  till  sunset. 
Major  MacBlarney  prodigalizes  his  offers  of  service  in  every 
conceivable  department  of  life,  and  winds  up  with  an  assuraneo 
that,  if  we  want  anything  in  those  departments  connected  with 
engineering — such  as  mining,  mapping,  surveying,  &c. — he  will 
serve  us,  bedad,  for  nothing,  or  next  to  it.  We  suspect  Major 
MacBlarney  to  be  a  civil  engineer,  suffering  under  the  innocent 
hallucination  that  he  has  been  in  the  army. 

Mr.  Speck  lets  out  to  me,  in  a  confidential  whisper,  that  Mr. 
Bullion  is  monstrous  rich,  and  has  made  his  fortune  from  small 
beginnings,  by  never  letting  a  good  thing  go.  I  think  of  Un- 
cle Jack's  pickled  onion,  and  Mr.  Speck's  meerschaum,  and 
perceive,  with  respectful  admiration,  that  Mr.  Bullion  acts  uni- 
formly on  one  grand  system.  Ten  minutes  afterwards,  Mr. 
Bullion  observes,  in  a  tone  equally  confidential,  that  Mr.  Speck, 
though  so  smiling  and  civil,  is  as  sharp  as  a  needle ;  and  that 
if  I  want  any  shares  in  the  new  speculation,  or  indeed  in  any 
other,  I  had  better  come  at  once  to  Bullion,  who  would  not 
deceive  me  for  my  weight  in  gold.  "Not,"  added  Bullion, 
^*  that  I  have  anything  to  say  against  Speck.  lie  is  well  enough 
to  do  in  the  world — a  warm  man,  sir;  and  when  a  man  is 
really  warm,  \  am  the  lasl  person  to  think  of  his  little  faults, 
and  turn  on  him  the  cold  shoulder." 

"Adieu!"  said  Uncle  Jack,  pulling  out  once  more  his  pock- 
et-handkerchiei  ;  "my  love  to  all  at  home."  And  sinking  his 
\  oice  into  a  whisper,  "  If  ever  you  think  belter  of  the  grog  and 

•re  depot,  nephew,  you'll  find  an  uncle's  heart  in  this  bosom!" 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  455 


CHAPTER  II. 

It  was  night  as  Vivian  and  myself  rode  slowly  home.  Night 
in  Australia !  How  impossible  to  describe  its  beauty !  Heav- 
en seems,  in  that  new  world,  so  much  nearer  to  earth !  Every 
star  stands  out  so  bright  and  particular,  as  if  fresh  from  the 
time  when  the  Maker  willed  it.  And  the  moon  like  a  large 
silvery  sun ; — the  least  object  on  which  it  shines  so  distinct 
and  so  still.*  Now  and  then  a  sound  breaks  the  silence,  but 
a  sound  so  much  in  harmony  with  the  solitude  that  it  only 
deepens  its  charms.  Hark !  the  low  cry  of  a  night-bird,  from 
yonder  glen  amidst  the  small  gray  gleaming  rocks.  Hark !  as 
night  deepens,  the  bark  of  the  distant  watch-clog,  or  the  low 
strange  howl  of  his  more  savage  species,  from  which  he  defends 
the  fold.  Hark!  the  echo  catches  the  sound,  and  flings  it 
sportively  from  hill  to  hill — farther,  and  farther,  and  farther 
down,  till  all  again  is  hushed,  and  the  flowers  hang  noiseless 
over  your  head,  as  you  ride  through  a  grove  of  the  giant  gum- 
trees.  Now  the  air  is  literally  charged  with  the  odours,  and 
the  sense  of  fragrance  grows  almost  painful  in  its  pleasure. 
You  quicken  your  pace,  and  escape  again  into  the  open  plains 
and  the  full  moonlight,  and  through  the  slender  tea-trees  catch 
the  gleam  of  the  river,  and  in  the  exquisite  fineness  of  the  at- 
mosphere hear  the  soothing  sound  of  its  murmur. 

Pisistkatus. — "  And  this  land  has  become  the  heritage  of 
our  people  !  Methinks  I  see,  as  I  gaze  around,  the  scheme  of 
the  All-beneficent  Father  disentangling  itself  clear  through  the 
troubled  history  of  mankind.  How  mysteriously,  while  Eu- 
rope rears  its  populations  and  fulfils  its  civilizing  mission,  these 
realms  have  been  concealed  from  its  eyes — divulged  to  us  just 
as  civilization  needs  the  solution  to  its  problems ;  a  vent  for 
feverish  energies,  baffled  in  the  crowd ;  offering  bread  to  the 
famished,  hope  to  the  desperate;  in  very  truth  enabling  the 

*  "I  have  frequently,"  says  Mr.  Wilkinson,  in  his  invaluable  work  upon 
South  Australia,  at  once  so  graphic  and  so  practical,  "been  out  on  a  jour- 
ney in  such  a  night,  and  whilst  allowing  the  horse  his  own  time  to  walk 
along  the  road,  have  solaced  myself  by  reading  in  the  still  moonlight." 


456  i  in:   I   \\ rONB: 

1  New  World  to  redress  the  balance  of  the  Old.'  Here,  what 
a  Latium  for  the  wandering  spirits, 

1  ( )n  various  seas  by  various  tempests  toss'd.' 

Bere,  the  actual  „Kneid  passes  before  our  eyes.  From  the 
huts  of  the  exiles  scattered  over  this  hardier  Italy,  who  cannot 
Bee  in  the  future, 

'A  race  from  whence  new  Alban  sires  shall  come, 
And  the  long  glories  of  a  future  liome !' " 

Vivian  (mournfully). — "  Is  it  from  the  outcasts  of  the  work- 
house, the  prison,  and  the  transport-ship,  that  a  second  Rome 
is  to  arise  ?" 

Pisistratus. — "  There  is  something  in  this  new  soil — in  the 
labour  it  calls  forth,  in  the  hope  it  inspires,  in  the  sense  oi 
jDroperty,  which  I  take  to  be  the  core  of  social  morals — that 
expedites  the  work  of  redemption  with  marvellous  rapidity. 
Take  them  altogether,  whatever  their  origin,  or  whatever 
brought  them  hither,  they  are  a  fine,  manly,  frank-hearted 
race,  these  colonists  now ! — rude,  not  mean,  especially  in  the 
Bush,  and,  I  suspect,  will  ultimately  become  as  gallant  and 
honest  a  population  as  that  now  springing  up  in  South  Aus- 
tralia, from  which  convicts  are  excluded — and  happily  excluded 
— for  the  distinction  will  sharpen  emulation.  As  to  the  rest, 
and  in  direct  answer  to  your  question,  I  fancy  even  the  eman- 
cipist part  of  our  population  every  whit  as  respectable  as  the 
mongrel  robbers  under  Romulus." 

Vivian. — "But  were  they  not  soldiers? — I  mean  the  first 
Romans?" 

Pisistratus. — "My  dear  cousin,  we  are  in  advance  of  those 
grim  outcasts,  if  we  can  get  lands,  houses,  and  wives  (though 
the  last  is  difficult,  and  it  is  well  that  we  have  no  white  Sa- 
bines  in  the  neighbourhood),  without  that  same  soldiering 
which  was  the  necessity  of  their  existence." 

Vivian  (after  a  pause). — "  I  have  written  to  my  father,  and 
to  yours  more  fully — stating  in  the  one  letter  my  wish,  in  the 
other  trying  to  explain  the  feeling  from  which  it  springs." 

Pisistratus. — "Are  the  letters  gone?" 

Vivian.—"  Ses.'.' 

Pisistratus. — "  And  you  would  not  show  them  to  me!" 

Vivian. — "Do  not  speak  so  reproachfully.  I  promised  your 
father  to  pour  out  my  whole  heart  to   him,  whenever  it  was 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  457 

troubled  and  at  strife.  I  promise  you  now  that  I  will  go  by 
his  advice." 

Pisisteatus  (disconsolately). — "What  is  there  in  this  mili- 
tary life  for  which  you  yearn  that  can  yield  you  more  food  for 
healthful  excitement  and  stirring  adventure  than  your  present 
pursuits  afford !" 

Viviax. — "  Distinction !  You  do  not  see  the  difference  be- 
tween us.  You  have  but  a  fortune  to  make,  I  have  a  name  to 
redeem  ;  you  look  calmly  on  to  the  future ;  I  have  a  dark  blot 
to  erase  from  the  past." 

Pisisteatus  (soothingly). — "It  is  erased.  Five  years  of  no 
weak  bewailings,  but  of  manly  reform,  steadfast  industry,  con- 
duct so  blameless  that  even  Guy  (whom  I  look  upon  as  the  in- 
carnation of  blunt  English  honesty)  half  doubts  whether  you  are 
''cute  enough  for  '  a  station' — a  character  already  so  high  that 
I  long  for  the  hour  when  you  will  again  take  your  father's 
spotless  name,  and  give  me  the  pride  to  own  our  kinship  to  the 
world, — all  this  surely  redeems  the  errors  arising  from  an  un- 
educated childhood  and  a  wandering  youth." 

Viviax  (leaning  over  his  horse,  and  putting  his  hand  on  my 
shoulder). — "  My  dear  friend,  what  do  I  owe  you  !"  Then  re- 
covering his  emotion,  and  pushing  on  at  a  quicker  pace,  while 
he  continues  to  speak :  "  But  can  you  not  see  that,  just  in  pro- 
portion as  my  comprehension  of  right  would  become  clear  and 
strong,  so  my  conscience  would  become  also  more  sensitive 
and  reproachful ;  and  the  better  I  understand  my  gallant  fa- 
ther, the  more  I  must  desire  to  be  as  he  would  have  had  his 
son.  Do  you  think  it  would  content  him,  could  he  see  me 
branding  cattle,  and  bargaining  with  bullock-drivers  ? — Was 
it  not  the  strongest  wish  of  his  heart  that  I  should  adopt  his 
own  career  ?  Have  I  not  heard  you  say  that  he  would  have 
had  you  too  a  soldier,  but  for  your  mother?  I  have  no  moth- 
er !  If  I  made  thousands,  and  tens  of  thousands,  by  this  igno- 
ble calling,  would  they  give  my  father  half  the  pleasure  that  he 
would  feel  at  seeing  my  name  honourably  mentioned  in  a  de- 
spatch ?  No,  no !  You  have  banished  the  gipsy  blood,  and 
now  the  soldier's  breaks  out !  Oh  for  one  glorious  day  in 
which  I  may  clear  my  way  into  fair  repute,  as  our  fathers  be- 
fore us! — when  tears  of  proud  joy  may  flow  from  those  eyes 
that  have  wept  such  hot  drops  at  my  shame — when  she,  too,  in 
her  high  station  beside  that  sleek  lord,  may  sav,  'His  heart 

u 


1:58  Tin-:  <  anion  a  : 

was  not  s«»  vile,  after  all  I1  Don't  argue  with  mc — it  is  in  vain  ! 
Pray,  rather,  that  I  may  have  leave  to  work  out  my  own  way  ; 
for  I  tell  you  that,  if  condemned  to  stay  here,  I  may  not  mur- 
mur aloud — I  may  go  through  this  round  of  low  duties  as  the 

brute  turns  the  wheel  of  a  mill!  but  my  heart  will  prey  on  it- 
self, and  you  shall  soon  write  on  my  gravestone  the  epitaph  of 
the  poor  poet  you  told  us  of,  whose  true  disease  was  the  thirst 
of  glory — 'Here  lies  one  whose  name  was  written  in  water.'" 
I  had  no  answer ;  that  contagious  ambition  made  my  own 
veins  run  more  warmly,  and  my  own  heart  beat  with  a  louder 
tumult.  Amidst  the  pastoral  scenes,  and  under  the  tranquil 
moonlight  of  the  New,  the  Old  World,  even  in  me,  rude  Bush- 
man, claimed  for  a  while  its  son.  But  as  we  rode  on,  the  air, 
so  inexpressibly  buoyant,  yet  soothing  as  an  anodyne,  restored 
me  to  peaceful  Nature.  Now  the  flocks,  in  their  snowy  clus- 
ters, were  seen  sleeping  under  the  stars ;  hark !  the  welcome 
of  the  watch-dogs;  see  the  light  gleaming  far  from  the  chink 
of  the  door !  And,  pausing,  I  said  aloud,  "  No,  there  is  more 
glory  in  laying  these  rough  foundations  of  a  mighty  state, 
though  no  trumpets  resound  with  your  victory — though  no 
laurels  shall  shadow  your  tomb — than  in  forcing  the  onward 
progress  of  your  race  over  burning  cities  and  hecatombs  of 
men  !"  I  looked  round  for  Vivian's  answer;  but,  ere  I  spoke, 
he  had  spurred  from  my  side,  and  I  saw  the  wild  dogs  slink- 
ing back  from  the  hoofs  of  his  horse,  as  he  rode  at  speed,  on 
the  sward,  through  the  moonlight. 


CHAPTER  III. 

The  weeks  and  the  months  rolled  on,  and  the  replies  to  Viv- 
ian's letters  came  at  last;  I  foreboded  too  well  their  purport. 
I  knew  that  my  father  could  not  set  himself  in  opposition  to 
the  deliberate  and  cherished  desire  of  a  man  who  had  now  ar- 
rived at  the  full  strength  of  his  understanding,  and  must  be 
left  at  liberty  to  make  his  own  election  of  the  paths  of  life. 
Long  after  that  date,  T  saw  Vivian's  letter  to  my  father;  and 
even  his  conversation  had  scarcely  prepared  mc  for  the  pathos 
of  that  confession  of  a  mind  remarkable  alike  for  its  strength 
and  its  weakness.  Tf  born  in  the  age,  or  submitted  to  the  in- 
fluences, "I'  religious  enthusiasm,  here  was  a  nature  that,  awak- 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  459 

ing  from  sin,  could  not  have  been  contented  with  the  sober 
duties  of  mediocre  goodness — that  would  have  plunged  into 
the  fiery  depths  of  monkish  fanaticism — wrestled  with  the  fiend 
in  the  hermitage,  or  marched  barefoot  on  the  infidel  with  a 
sackcloth  for  armour — the  cross  for  a  sword.  Now,  the  im- 
patient desire  for  redenrption  took  a  more  mundane  direction, 
but  with  something  that  seemed  almost  spiritual  in  its  fervour. 
And  this  enthusiasm  flowed  through  strata  of  such  profound 
melancholy !  Deny  it  a  vent,  and  it  might  sicken  into  lethar- 
gy, or  fret  itself  into  madness — give  it  the  vent,  and  it  might 
vivify  and  fertilize  as  it  swept  along. 

My  lather's  reply  to  this  letter  was  what  might  be  expected. 
It  gently  reinforced  the  old  lessons  in  the  distinctions  between 
aspirations  towards  the  perfecting  ourselves — aspirations  that 
are  never  in  vain — and  the  morbid  passion  for  applause  from 
others,  which  shifts  conscience  from  our  own  bosoms  to  the 
confused  Babel  of  the  crowd,  and  calls  it  "fame."  But  my  fa- 
ther, in  his  counsels,  did  not  seek  to  oppose  a  mind  so  obsti- 
nately bent  upon  a  single  course — he  sought  rather  to  guide 
and  strengthen  it  in  the  way  it  should  go.  The  seas  of  human 
life  are  wide.  "Wisdom  may  suggest  the  voyage,  but  it  must 
first  look  to  the  condition  of  the  ship,  and  the  nature  of  the 
merchandise  to  exchange.  Not  every  vessel  that  sails  from 
Tarshish  can  bring  back  the  gold  of  Ophir ;  but  shall  it  there- 
fore rot  in  the  harbour  ?     No  ;  give  its  sails  to  the  wind ! 

But  I  had  expected  that  Roland's  letter  to  his  son  would 
have  been  full  of  joy  and  exultation — joy  there  was  none  in  it, 
yet  exultation  there  might  be,  though  serious,  grave,  and  sub- 
dued. In  the  proud  assent  that  the  old  soldier  gave  to  his 
son's  wish,  in  his  entire  comprehension  of  motives  so  akin  to 
his  own  nature,  there  was  yet  a  visible  sorrow ;  it  seemed  even 
as  if  he  constrained  himself  to  the  assent  he  gave.  Not  till  I 
had  read  it  again  and  again  could  I  divine  Roland's  feelings 
while  he  wrote.  At  this  distance  of  time,  I  comprehend  them 
well.  Had  he  sent  from  his  side,  into  noble  warfare,  some  boy 
fresh  to  life,  new  to  sin,  with  an  enthusiasm  pure  and  single- 
hearted  as  his  own  young  chivalrous  ardour,  then,  with  all  a 
soldier's  joy,  he  had  yielded  a  cheerful  tribute  to  the  hosts  of 
England ;  but  here  he  recognized,  though  perhaps  dimly,  not 
the  frank  military  fervour,  but  the  stern  desire  of  expiation, 
and  in  that  thought  he  admitted  forebodings  that  would  have 


•100  Till;   <  AJLTON6  : 

been  otherwise  rejected;  so  that,  at  the  close  of  the  letter,  it 
Beemed  nol  the  fiery  war-seasoned  Roland  that  wrote,  bnt  rath- 
er BOme  timid,  anxious  mother.  Warningfl  and  entreaties  and 
cautions  not  to  be  rash,  and  assurances  that  the  best  soldiers 
were  ever  the  most  prudent  ;  were  these  the  counsels  of  the 
tierce  veteran,  who,  at  the  head  of  the  forlorn  hope,  had  mount- 
ed the  wall  at ,  his  sword  between  his  teeth! 

I  hit,  whatever  his  presentiments,  Roland  had  yielded  at  once 
to  his  son's  prayer — hastened  to  London  at  the  receipt  of  his 
letter — obtained  a  commission  in  a  regiment  now  in  active 
service  in  India;  and  that  commission  was  made  out  in  his 
son's  name.  The  commission,  with  an  order  to  join  the  regi- 
ment as  soon  as  possible,  accompanied  the  letter. 

And  Vivian,  pointing  to  the  name  addressed  to  him,  said, 
"  Now,  indeed,  I  may  resume  this  name,  and,  next  to  Heaven, 
will  I  hold  it  sacred!  It  shall  guide  me  to  glory  in  life,  or 
my  father  shall  read  it,  without  shame,  on  my  tomb  !"  I  see 
him  before  me,  as  he  stood  then — his  form  erect,  his  dark  eyes 
solemn  in  their  light,  a  serenity  in  his  smile,  a  grandeur  on  his 
brow,  that  I  had  never  marked  till  then  !  Was  that  the  same 
man  I  had  recoiled  from  as  the  sneering  cynic,  shuddered  at  as 
the  audacious  traitor,  or  wept  over  as  the  cowering  outcast? 
Bow  little  the  nobleness  of  aspect  depends  on  symmetry  of 
feature,  or  the  mere  proportions  of  form !  What  dignity  robes 
the  man  who  is  filled  with  a  lofty  thought ! 


CHAPTER  IV. 

He  is  gone!  he  has  left  a  void  in  my  existence.  I  had 
grown  to  love  him  so  well ;  I  had  been  so  proud  when  men 
praised  him.  My  love  was  a  sort  of  self-love — I  had  looked 
upon  him  in  part  as  the  work  of  my  own  hands.  I  am  a  long 
time  ere  I  can  settle  back,  with  good  heart,  to  my  pastoral 
life.  Before  my  cousin  went,  we  cast  up  our  gains  and  settled 
our  shares.  When  lie  resigned  the  allowance  which  Roland 
had  made  him,  his  father  secretly  gave  to  me,  for  his  use,  a 
sum  equal  to  that  wliieh  T  and  Guy  Bolding  brought  into  the 
commoiwstock.  Roland  had  raise. I  the  sum  upon  mortgage; 
and,  while  the  interesl  was  a  t  rivial  deduction  from  his  income, 
compared  to  the  former  allowance,  the  capital  was  much  more 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  461 

useful  to  his  son  than  a  mere  yearly  payment  could  have  been. 
Thus,  between  us,  we  had  a  considerable  sum  for  Australian 
settlers — £4500.  For  the  first  two  years  we  made  nothing; 
indeed,  great  part  of  the  first  year  was  spent  in  learning  our 
art  at  the  station  of  an  old  settler.  But  at  the  end  of  the  third 
year,  our  flocks  having  then  become  very  considerable,  we 
cleared  a  return  beyond  my  most  sanguine  expectations.  And 
when  my  cousin  left,  just  in  the  sixth  year  of  exile,  our  shares 
amounted  to  £4000  each,  exclusive  of  the  value  of  the  two 
stations.  My  cousin  had,  at  first,  wished  that  I  should  forward 
his  share  to  his  father,  but  he  soon  saw  that  Roland  would 
never  take  it ;  and  it  was  finally  agreed  that  it  should  rest  in 
my  hands,  for  me  to  manage  for  him,  send  him  out  an  interest 
at  five  per  cent.,  and  devote  the  surplus  profits  to  the  increase 
of  his  capital.  I  had  now,  therefore,  the  control  of  £12,000, 
and  we  might  consider  ourselves  very  respectable  capitalists. 
I  kept  on  the  cattle  station,  by  the  aid  of  the  Will-o'-the-Wisp, 
for  about  two  years  after  Vivian's  departure  (we  had  then  had 
it  altogether  for  five).  At  the  end  of  that  time,  I  sold  it  and 
the  stock  to  great  advantage.  And  the  sheep — for  the  "  brand" 
of  which  I  had  a  high  reputation — having  wonderfully  pros- 
leered  in  the  meanwhile,  I  thought  we  might  safely  extend  our 
speculations  into  new  ventures.  Glad,  too,  of  a  change  of 
scene,  I  left  Bolding  in  charge  of  the  flocks,  and  bent  my  course 
to  Adelaide,  for  the  fame  of  that  new  settlement  had  already 
disturbed  the  peace  of  the  Bush.  I  found  Uncle  Jack  residing 
near  Adelaide,  in  a  very  handsome  villa,  with  all  the  signs  and 
appurtenances  of  colonial  opulence ;  and  report,  perhaps,  did 
not  exaggerate  the  gains  he  had  made : — so  many  strings  to 
his  bow — and  each  arrow,  this  time,  seemed  to  have  gone 
straight  to  the  white  of  the  butts.  I  now  thought  I  had  ac- 
quired knowledge  and  caution  sufficient  to  avail  myself  of 
Uncle  Jack's  ideas,  without  ruining  myself  by  following  them 
out  in  his  company ;  and  I  saw  a  kind  of  retributive  justice  in 
making  his  brain  minister  to  the  fortunes  which  his  ideality 
and  constructiveness,  according  to  Squills,  had  served  so  nota- 
bly to  impoverish.  I  must  here  gratefully  acknowledge  that 
I  owed  much  to  this  irregular  genius.  The  investigation  of 
the  supposed  mines  had  proved  unsatisfactory  to  Mr.  Bullion ; 
and  they  were  not  fairly  discovered  till  a  few  years  after. 
But  Jack  had  convinced  himself  of  their  existence,  and  pur- 


402  the  caxtobb: 

chased,  on  his  own  .account,  "for  an  old  song,"  some  barren 
land,  which  he  waa  persuaded  would  prove  to  him  a  Golconda, 
one  day  or  other,  under  the  euphonious  title  (which,  indeed, it 
ultimately  established)  of  the  "Tibbets'  Wheal."  The  suspen- 
sion  of  the  mines,  however,  fortunately  suspended  the  existence 
of  the  Grog  and  Store  Depot,  and  Uncle  Jack  was  now  assist - 
ing  in  the  foundation  of  Port  Philip.  Profiting  by  his  advice, 
I  adventured  in  that  new  settlement  some  timid  and  wary  pur- 
chases, which  I  resold  to  considerable  advantage.  Meanwhile, 
I  must  not  omit  to  state  briefly  what,  since  my  departure  from 
England,  had  been  the  ministerial  career  of  Trevanion. 

That  refining  fastidiousness, — that  scrupulosity  of  political 
conscience,  which  had  characterized  him  as  an  independent 
member,  and  often  served,  in  the  opinion  both  of  friend  and 
foe,  to  give  the  attribute  of  general  impracticability  to  a  mind 
that,  in  all  details,  was  so  essentially  and  laboriously  practical 
— might  perhaps  have  founded  Trevanion's  reputation  as  a 
minister,  if  he  could  have  been  a  minister  without  colleagues 
— if,  standing  alone,  and  from  the  necessary  height,  he  could 
have  placed,  clear  and  single,  before  the  world,  his  exquisite 
honesty  of  purpose,  and  the  width  of  a  statesmanship  marvel- 
lously accomplished  and  comprehensive.  But  Trevanion  could 
not  amalgamate  with  others,  nor  subscribe  to  the  discipline  of 
a  cabinet  in  which  he  was  not  the  chief,  especially  in  a  policy 
which  must  have  been  thoroughly  abhorrent  to  such  a  nature 
— a  policy  that,  of  late  years,  has  distinguished  not  one  faction 
alone,  but  has  seemed  so  forced  upon  the  more  eminent  polit- 
ical leaders,  on  either  side,  that  they  who  take  the  more  char- 
itable view  of  things  may,  perhaps,  hold  it  to  arise  from  the 
necessity  of  the  age,  fostered  by  the  temper  of  the  public — I 
mean  the  policy  of  Expediency.  Certainly  not  in  this  book 
will  I  introduce  the  angry  elements  of  party  politics  ;  and  how 
should  I  know  much  about  them?  All  that  I  have  to  say  is, 
that,  right  or  wrong,  such  a  policy  must  have  been  at  war, 
every  moment,  with  each  principle  of  Trevanion's  statesman- 
ship, and  fretted  each  fibre  of  his  moral  constitution.  The 
aristocratic  combinations  which  his  alliance  with  the  Castleton 
interest  had  brought  to  his  aid,  served  perhaps  to  fortify  his 
position  in  the  cabinet  ;  yet  aristocratic  combinations  were  of 
Bmal]  avail  against  what  seemed  the  atmospherical  epidemic  of 
the  age.     T  could  see  how  his  situation  had  preyed  on  his  mind, 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  463 

when  I  read  a  paragraph  in  the  newspapers,  "  that  it  was  re- 
ported, on  good  authority,  that  Mr.  Trevanion  had  tendered 
his  resignation,  but  had  been  prevailed  upon  to  withdraw  it, 
as  his  retirement  at  that  moment  would  break  up  the  govern- 
ment." Some  months  afterwards  came  another  paragraph,  to 
the  effect,  "  that  Mr.  Trevanion  was  taken  suddenly  ill,  and 
that  it  was  feared  his  illness  was  of  a  nature  to  preclude  his 
resuming  his  official  labours."  Then  parliament  broke  up.  Be- 
fore it  met  again,  Mr.  Trevanion  was  gazetted  ^as  Earl  of  Ul- 
verstone — a  title  that  had  been  once  in  his  family — and  had 
left  the  administration,  unable  to  encounter  the  fatigues  .of 
office.  To  an  ordinary  man,  the  elevation  to  an  earldom,  pass- 
ing over  the  lesser  honours  in  the  peerage,  would  have  seemed 
no  mean  close  to  a  political  career ;  but  I  felt  what  profound 
despair  of  striving  against  circumstances  for  utility — what  en- 
tanglements with  his  colleagues,  whom  he  could  neither  con- 
scientiously support,  nor,  according  to  his  high  old-fashioned 
notions  of  party  honour  and  etiquette,  energetically  oppose — 
had  driven  him  to  abandon  that  stormy  scene  in  which  his  ex- 
istence had  been  passed.  The  House  of  Lords,  to  that  active 
intellect,  was  as  the  retirement  of  some  warrior  of  old  into  the 
cloisters  of  a  convent.  The  gazette  that  chronicled  the  earl- 
dom of  Ulverstone  was  the  proclamation  that  Albert  Trevan- 
ion lived  no  more  for  the  world  of  public  men.  And,  indeed, 
from  that  date  his  career  vanished  out  of  sight.  Trevanion 
died — the  Earl  of  Ulverstone  made  no  sign. 

I  had  hitherto  written  but  twice  to  Lady  Ellinor  during  my 
exile — once  upon  the  marriage  of  Fanny  with  Lord  Castleton, 
which  took  place  about  six  months  after  I  sailed  from  England, 
and  again,  when  thanking  her  husband  for  some  rare  animals, 
equine,  pastoral,  and  bovine,  which  he  had  sent  as  presents  to 
Bolding  and  myself.  I  wrote  again  after  Trevanion's  elevation 
to  the  peerage,  and  received,  in  due  time,  a  reply,  confirming 
all  my  impressions — for  it  was  full  of  bitterness  and  gall,  ac- 
cusations of  the  world,  fears  for  the  country :  Richelieu  him- 
self could  not  have  taken  a  gloomier  view  of  things,  when  his 
levees  were  deserted,  and  his  power  seemed  annihilated  before 
the  "  Day  of  Dupes."  Only  one  gleam  of  comfort  appeared 
to  visit  Lady  Ulverstone's  breast,  and  thence  to  settle  prospect- 
ively over  the  future  of  the  world — a  second  son  had  been 
born  to  Lord  Castleton ;  to  that  son  would  descend  the  estates 


It;  J  t  i  in:  CAXTONS  : 

of  [Jlverstone,  and  the  representation  of  that  line  distinguished 
~\>\  Trevanion,  and  enriched  by  Trevanion's  wile.     Never  was 
there  a  child  of  such  promise!     Not  Virgil  himself,  when  he 
called  on  the  Sicilian  Muses  to  celebrate  the  advent  of  a  son 
t<»  Pollio,  ever  sounded  a  loftier  strain.     Here  was  one,  now, 
perchance,  engaged  on  words  of  two  syllables,  called — 
"  By  labouring  nature  to  sustain 
The  nodding  frame  of  heaven,  and  earth,  and  main, 
See  to  their  base  restored,  earth,  sea,  and  air, 
And  joyful  ages  from  behind  in  crowding  ranks  appear  !" 

Happy  dream  which  Heaven  sends  to  grand-parents!  re- 
baptism  of  Hope  in  the  font  wdiose  drops  sprinkle  the  grand- 
child ! 

Time  flies  on ;  affairs  continue  to  prosper.  I  am  just  leav- 
ing the  bank  at  Adelaide  with  a  satisfied  air,  when  I  am  stop- 
ped in  the  street  by  bowing  acquaintances,  who  never  shook 
me  by  the  hand  before.  They  shake  me  by  the  hand  now,  and 
cry — "  I  wTish  you  joy,  sir.  That  brave  fellow,  your  namesake, 
is  of  course  your  near  relation." 

"  What  do  you  mean  ?" 

"  Have  not  you  seen  the  papers  ?     Here  they  are." 

"  Gallant  conduct  of  Ensign  de  Caxton — promoted  to  a  lieu- 
tenancy on  the  field." — I  wipe  my  eyes,  and  cry — "  Thank 
Heaven — it  is  my  cousin!"  Then  new  hand-shakings,  new 
groups  gather  round.  I  feel  taller  by  the  head  than  I  was  be- 
fore !  We,  grumbling  English,  always  quarrelling  with  each 
other — the  world  not  wide  enough  to  hold  us ;  and  yet,  when 
in  the  far  land  some  bold  deed  is  done  by  a  countryman,  how 
we  feel  that  we  are  brothers !  how  our  hearts  warm  to  each 
other!  What  a  letter  I  Avrote  home!  and  how  joyously  I 
went  back  to  the  Bush  !  The  Will-o'-the-Wisp  has  attained 
to  a  cattle  station  of  his  own.  I  go  fifty  miles  out  of  my  way 
to  tell  him  the  news  and  give  him  the  newspaper;  for  he 
knows  now  that  his  old  master, Vivian,  is  a  Cumberland  man 
— a  Caxton.  Poor  Will-o'-the-Wisp!  The  tea  that  night 
tasted  uncommonly  like  whisky-punch  !  Father  Mathew  for- 
give  us — but  if  you  had  been  a  Cumberland  man,  and  heard 
the  Will-o'-the-Wisp  roaring  out,  "  Blue  Bonnets  over  the  Bor- 
ders," I  think  your  tea,  too,  would  not  have  come  out  of  the 
caddy! 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  465 


CHAPTER  V. 

A  geeat  change  has  occurred  in  our  household.  Guy's  fa- 
ther is  dead — his  latter  years  cheered  by  the  accounts  of  his 
son's  steadiness  and  prosperity,  and  by  the  touching  proofs 
thereof  which  Guy  has  exhibited.  For  he  insisted  on  repay- 
ing to  his  father  the  old  college  debts,  and  the  advance  of  the 
£1500,  begging  that  the  money  might  go  towards  his  sister's 
portion.  Now,  after  the  old  gentleman's  death,  the  sister  re- 
solved to  come  out  and  live  with  her  dear  brother  Guy.  An- 
other wing  is  built  to  the  hut.  Ambitious  plans  for  a  new 
stone  house,  to  be  commenced  the  following  year,  are  enter- 
tained ;  and  Guy  has  brought  back  from  Adelaide  not  only  a 
sister,  but,  to  my  utter  astonishment,  a  wife,  in  the  shape  of  a 
fair  friend  by  whom  the  sister  is  accompanied. 

The  young  lady  did  quite  right  to  come  to  Australia  if  she 
wanted  to  be  married.  She  was  very  pretty,  and  all  the  beaux 
in  Adelaide  were  round  her  in  a  moment.  Guy  was  in  love 
the  first  day — in  a  rage  with  thirty  rivals  the  next — in  despair 
the  third — put  the  question  the  fourth — and  before  the  fifteenth 
was  a  married  man,  hastening  back  with  a  treasure,  of  which 
he  fancied  all  the  world  was  conspiring  to  rob  him.  His  sister 
was  quite  as  pretty  as  her  friend,  and  she,  too,  had  offers 
enough  the  moment  she  landed — only  she  was  romantic  and 
fastidious,  and  I  fancy  Guy  told  her  that  "  I  was  just  made  for 
her." 

However,  charming  though  she  be — with  pretty  blue  eyes, 
and  her  brother's  frank  smile — I  am  not  enchanted.  I  fancy 
she  lost  all  chance  of  my  heart  by  stepping  across  the  yard  in 
a  pair  of  silk  shoes.  If  I  were  to  live  in  the  Bush,  give  me  a 
wife  as  a  companion  who  can  ride  well,  leap  over  a  ditch,  walk 
beside  me  when  I  go  forth  gun  in  hand,  for  a  shot  at  the  kan- 
garoos. But  I  dare  not  go  on  with  a  list  of  the  Bush  husband's 
requisites.  This  change,  however,  serves,  for  various  reasons, 
to  quicken  my  desire  of  return.  Ten  years  have  now  elapsed, 
and  I  have  already  obtained  a  much  larger  fortune  than  I  had 
calculated  to  make.     Sorely  to  Guy's  honest  grief,  I  therefore 

TJ2 


4Gl)  the  cax'ions  : 

wound  up  our  affairs,  and  dissolved  partnership:  for  he  had 
decided  to  pass  his  life  in  the  colony — and  with  his  pretty 
wife,  who  has  grown  very  fond  of  him,  I  don't  wonder  at  it. 
Guy  takes  my  share  of  the  station  and  stock  off  my  hands; 
and,  all  accounts  square  between  us,  I  bid  farewell  to  the  Bush. 
J  Respite  all  the  motives  that  drew  my  heart  homeward,  it  was 
not  without  participation  in  the  sorrow  of  my  old  companions, 
that  I  took  leave  of  those  I  might  never  see  again  on  this  side 
the  grave.  The  meanest  man  in  my  employ  had  grown  a 
friend;  and  when  those  hard  hands  grasped  mine,  and  from 
many  a  breast  that  once  had  waged  fierce  war  with  the  world, 
came  the  soft  blessing  to  the  Homeward-bound — with  a  ten- 
der thought  for  the  Old  England,  that  had  been  but  a  harsh 
stepmother  to  them — I  felt  a  choking  sensation,  which  I  sus- 
pect is  little  known  to  the  friendships  of  May-fair  and  St. 
James's.  I  was  forced  to  get  off  with  a  few  broken  words, 
when  I  had  meant  to  part  with  a  long  speech:  perhaps  the 
broken  words  pleased  the  audience  better.  Spurring  away,  I 
gained  a  little  eminence  and  looked  back.  There  were  the 
poor  faithful  fellows  gathered  in  a  ring  watching  me — their 
hats  off,  their  hands  shading  their  eyes  from  the  sun.  And 
Guy  had  thrown  himself  on  the  ground,  and  I  heard  his  loud 
sobs  distinctly.  His  wife  was  leaning  over  his  shoulder,  try- 
ing to  soothe.  Forgive  him,  fair  helpmate — you  will  be  all 
in  the  world  to  him — to-morrow !  And  the  blue-eyed  sister, 
where  was  she?  Had  she  no  tears  for  the  rough  friend  who 
laughed  at  the  silk  shoes,  and  taught  her  bow  to  hold  the 
reins,  and  never  fear  that  the  old  pony  would  run  away  with 
her  ?  What  matter  ? — if  the  tears  were  shed,  they  were  hid- 
den tears.  No  shame  in  them,  fair  Ellen — since  then,  thou 
hast  wept  happy  tears  over  thy  first-born — those  tears  have 
long  ago  washed  away  all  bitterness  in  the  innocent  memories 
of  a  girl's  first  fancy. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

DATED   FROM   ADELAIDE. 


Tmaotne  my  wonder — Uncle  Jack  has  just  been  writh  me, 
and — but  hear  the  dialogue — 

I'm  i.i;  Jack. — "So  you  are  positively  going  back  to  that 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  467 

smoky,  fusty,  old  England,  just  when  you  are  on  your  high- 
road to  a  plum.  A  plum,  sir,  at  least !  They  all  say  there  is 
not  a  more  rising  young  man  in  the  colony.  I  think  Bullion 
would  take  you  into  partnership.  What  are  you  in  such  a 
hurry  for  ?" 

Pisisteatus. — "To  see  my  father  and  mother,  and  Uncle 
Roland,  and" — (was  about  to  name  some  one  else,  but  stops). 
"  You  see,  my  dear  uncle,  I  came  out  solely  with  the  idea  of 
repairing  my  father's  losses  in  that  unfortunate  speculation  of 
The  Capitalist:" 

Uncle  Jack  (coughs  and  ejaculates) — "That  villain  Peck!" 

Pisisteatus. — "And  to  have  a  few  thousands  to  invest  in 
poor  Roland's  acres.  The  object  is  achieved:  why  should  I 
stay?" 

Uncle  Jack. — "A  few  paltry  thousands,  when  in  twenty 
years  more,  at  the  farthest,  you  would  wallow  in  gold!" 

Pisisteatus. — "  A  man  learns  in  the  Bush  how  happy  life 
can  be  with  plenty  of  employment  and  very  little  money.  I 
shall  practise  that  lesson  in  England." 

Uxcle  Jack. — "  Your  mind's  made  up  ?" 

Pisisteatus. — "  And  my  place  in  the  ship  taken." 

Uxcle  Jack. — "  Then  there's  no  more  to  be  said."  (Hums, 
haws,  and  examines  his  nails — filbert  nails,  not  a  speck  on 
them.  Then  suddenly,  and  jerking  up  his  head) — "That  Cap- 
italist I  it  has  been  on  my  conscience,  nephew,  ever  since ;  and, 
somehow  or  other,  since  I  have  abandoned  the  cause  of  my  fel- 
low-creatures, I  think  I  have  cared  more  for  my  relations." 

Pisisteatus  (smiling  as  he  remembers  his  father's  shrewd 
predictions  thereon). — "Naturally,  my  dear  uncle:  any  child 
who  has  thrown  a  stone  into  a  pond  knows  that  a  circle  disap- 
pears as  it  widens." 

Uxcle  Jack. — "  Very  true — I  shall  make  a  note  of  that,  ap- 
plicable to  my  next  speech,  in  defence  of  what  they  call  the 
'land  monopoly.'  Thank  you — stone — circle!"  (Jots  down 
notes  in  his  pocket-book).  "  But,  to  return  to  the  point :  I  am 
well  off  now — I  have  neither  wife  nor  child  ;  and  I  feel  that  I 
ought  to  bear  my  share  in  your  father's  loss:  it  was  our  joint 
speculation.  And  your  father,  good,  dear  Austin !  paid  my 
debts  into  the  bargain.  And  how  cheering  the  punch  was 
that  night,  when  your  mother  wanted  to  scold  poor  Jack! 
And  the  £300  Austin  lent  me  when  I  left  him :  nephew,  that 


168  THE   CAXTOHB  ! 

v\  as  the  re-making  of  mc — the  acorn  of  the  oak  I  have  planted. 
So  lirir  they  are"  (added  Uncle  Jack, with  a  heroical  effort — 
and  he  extracted  from  the  pocket-book  bills  for  a  sum  between 
three  and  four  thousand  pounds).  "There,  it  is  done;  audi 
shall  sleep  better  for  it !"  (With  that  Uncle  Jack  got  up,  and 
bolted  out  of  the  room.) 

Ought  I  to  take  the  money  ?  Why,  I  think  yes  ! — it  is  but 
fair.  Jack  must  be  really  rich,  and  can  well  spare  the  money; 
besides,  if  he  wants  it  again,  I  know  my  father  will  let  him 
have  it.  And,  indeed,  Jack  caused  the  loss  of  the  whole  sum 
lost  on  The  Capitalist,  &c. :  and  this  is  not  quite  the  half  of 
what  my  father  paid  away.  But  is  it  not  fine  in  Uncle  Jack! 
Well,  my  father  was  quite  right  in  his  milder  estimate  of  Jack's 
scalene  conformation,  and  it  is  hard  to  judge  of  a  man  when 
he  is  needy  and  down  in  the  world.  When  one  grafts  one's 
ideas  on  one's  neighbour's  money,  they  are  certainly  not  so 
grand  as  when  they  spring  from  one's  own. 

Uncle  Jack  (popping  his  head  into  the  room). — "And,  you 
see,  you  can  double  that  money  if  you  will  just  leave  it  in  my 
hands  for  a  couple  of  years — you  have  no  notion  what  I  shall 
make  of  the  Tibbet's  Wheal!  Did  I  tell  you? — the  German 
was  quite  right — I  have  been  offered  already  seven  times  the 
sum  which  I  gave  for  the  land.  But  I  am  now  looking  out 
for  a  company :  let  me  put  you  down  for  shares  to  the  amount 
at  least  of  those  trumpery  bills.  Cent,  per  cent. — I  guarantee 
cent,  per  cent. !  (And  Uncle  Jack  stretches  out  those  famous 
smooth  hands  of  his,  with  a  tremulous  motion  of  the  ten  elo- 
quent fingers.) 

Pisistratus. — "  Ah !  my  dear  uncle,  if  you  repent" — 

Uncle  Jack. — "Repent!  when  I  offer  you  cent,  per  cent., 
on  my  personal  guarantee !" 

I'isistratus  (carefully  putting  the  bills  into  his  breast  coat 
pocket). — "  Then,  if  you  don't  repent,  my  dear  uncle,  allow  me 
to  shake  you  by  the  hand,  and  say  that  I  will  not  consent  to 
lessen  my  esteem  and  admiration  for  the  high  principle  which 
prompts  this  restitution  by  confounding  it  with  trading  asso- 
ciations of  loans,  interests,  and  copper-mines.  And,  you  see, 
since  this  sum  is  paid  to  my  father,  I  have  no  right  to  invest  it 
without  his  permission." 

l'\<  u:  Jack  (with  emotion). — "'Esteem,  admiration,  high 
principle!' — these    arc    pleasant   words   from   you,  nephew." 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  469 

(Then,  shaking  his  head,  and  smiling) — "  You  sly  dog !  you  are 
quite  right :  get  the  bills  cashed  at  once.  And  hark  ye,  sir, 
just  keep  out  of  my  way,  will  you  ?  and  don't  let  me  coax 
from  you  a  farthing."  (Uncle  Jack  slams  the  door  and  rushes 
out.  Pisistratus  draws  the  bills  warily  from  his  pocket,  half- 
suspecting  they  must  already  have  turned  into  withered  leaves, 
like  fairy  money ;  slowly  convinces  himself  that  the  bills  are 
good  bills ;  and,  by  lively  gestures,  testifies  his  delight  and  as- 
tonishment.)    Scene  changes. 


PAET  EIGHTEENTH. 

CHAPTER  I. 

Adieu,  thou  beautiful  laud !  Canaan  of  the  exiles,  and  Ar- 
arat to  many  a  shattered  Ark !  Fair  cradle  of  a  race  for  whom 
the  unbounded  heritage  of  a  future,  that  no  sage  can  conject- 
ure, no  prophet  divine,  lies  afar  in  the  golden  promise-light  of 
Time ! — destined,  perchance,  from  the  sins  and  sorrows  of  a 
civilization  struggling  with  its  own  elements  of  decay,  to  re- 
new the  youth  of  the  world,  and  transmit  the  great  soul  of  En- 
gland through  the  cycles  of  Infinite  Change.  All  climates  that 
can  best  ripen  the  products  of  earth,  or  form  into  various  char- 
acter and  temper  the  different  families  of  man,  "rain  influences" 
from  the  heaven,  that  smiles  so  benignly  on  those  who  had 
once  shrunk,  ragged,  from  the  wind,  or  scowled  on  the  thank- 
less sun.  Here,  the  hardy  air  of  the  chill  Mother  Isle,  there 
the  mild  warmth  of  Italian  autumns,  or  the  breathless  glow  of 
the  tropics.  And  with  the  beams  of  every  climate,  glides 
subtle  Hope.  Of  her  there,  it  may  be  said,  as  of  Light  itself, 
in  those  exquisite  lines  of  a  neglected  poet — 

"Through  the  soft  ways  of  heaven,  and  air,  and  sea. 

Which  open  all  their  pores  to  thee ; 

Like  a  clear  river  thou  dost  glide — 

All  the  world's  bravery  that  delights  our  eyes, 

Is  but  thy  several  liveries ; 

Thou  the  rich  dye  on  them  bestowest ; 

The  nimble  pencil  paints  the  landscape  as  thou  goest."* 

Adieu,  my  kind  nurse  and  sweet  foster-mother  ! — a  long  and  a 
last  adieu !  Never  had  I  left  thee  but  for  that  louder  voice  of 
Nature  which  calls  the  child  to  the  parent,  and  woos  us  from 
the  labours  we  love  the  best  by  the  chime  in  the  Sabbath-bells 
of  Home. 

No  one  can  tell  how  dear  the  memory  of  that  wild  Bush 
life  bcc(,  lues  1<>  him  who  has  tried  it  with  a  fitting  spirit.   How 
often   it   haunts  him  in   the   commonplace  of  more  civilized 
*  Cowley's  Ode  to  Light. 


THE   CAXTONS.  471 

scenes !  Its  dangers,  its  risks,  its  sense  of  animal  health,  its 
bursts  of  adventure,  its  interval  of  careless  repose :  the  fierce 
gallop  through  a  very  sea  of  rolling  plains — the  still  saunter, 
at  night,  through  woods  never  changing  their  leaves ;  with  the 
moon,  clear  as  sunshine,  stealing  slant  through  their  clusters 
of  flowers.  With  what  an  effort  we  reconcile  ourselves  to  the 
trite  cares  and  vexed  pleasures,  "  the  quotidian  ague  of  frigid 
impertinences,"  to  which  we  return !  How  strong  and  black 
stands  my  pencil-mark  in  this  passage  of  the  poet  from  whom 
I  have  just  quoted  before ! — 

"  We  are  here  among  the  vast  and  noble  scenes  of  Nature — 
we  are  there  among  the  pitiful  shifts  of  policy ;  we  walk  here, 
in  the  light  and  open  ways  of  the  Divine  Bounty — we  grope 
there  in  the  dark  and  confused  labyrinth  ol  human  malice."* 

But  I  weary  you,  reader.  The  New  World  vanishes — now 
a  Hue — now  a  speck;  let  us  turn  away,  with  the  face  to  the 
Old. 

Amongst  my  fellow-passengers,  how  many  there  are  return- 
ing home  disgusted,  disappointed,  impoverished,  ruined,  throw- 
ing themselves  again  on  those  unsuspecting  poor  friends,  who 
thought  they  had  done  with  the  luckless  good-for-naughts  for 
ever.  For,  don't  let  me  deceive  thee,  reader,  into  supposing 
that  every  adventurer  to  Australia  has  the  luck  of  Pisistratus. 
Indeed,  though  the  poor  labourer,  and  especially  the  poor  op- 
erative from  London  and  the  great  trading  towns,  (who  has 
generally  more  of  the  quick  knack  of  learning — the  adaptable 
faculty — required  in  a  new  colony,  than  the  simple  agricul- 
tural labourer),  are  pretty  sure  to  succeed,  the  class  to  which 
I  belong  is  one  in  which  failures  are  numerous,  and  success  the 
exception — I  mean  young  men  with  scholastic  education  and 
the  habits  of  gentlemen — with  small  capital  and  sanguine 
hopes.  But  this,  in  ninety-nine  times  out  of  a  hundred,  is  not 
the  fault  of  the  colony,  but  of  the  emigrants.  It  requires,  not 
so  much  intellect  as  a  peculiar  turn  of  intellect,  and  a  fortunate 
combination  of  physical  qualities,  easy  temper,  and  quick  moth- 
er-wit, to  make  a  small  capitalist  a  prosperous  Bushman. f    And 

*  Cowley  on  Town  and  Country.     (Discourse  on  Agriculture. ) 

f  How  true  are  the  following  remarks : — 

"  Action  is  the  first  great  requisite  of  a  colonist  (that  is,  a  pastoral  or  ag- 
ricultural settler).  With  a  young  man,  the  tone  of  his  mind  is  more  im- 
portant than  his  previous  pursuits.     I  have  known  men  of  an  active,  ener- 


472  THE   CAXTONS  : 

if  you  could  Bee  the  Bharks  that  swim  round  a  man  just  drop- 
ped  at  Adelaide  or  Sydney,  with  one  or  two  thousand  pounds 

in  his  pocket  !  Hurry  out  of  the  towns  as  fast  as  you  can,  my 
young  emigrant;  turn  a  deal"  car,  for  the  present  at  least,  to 
all  jobbers  and  speculators  ;  make  friends  with  some  practised 
old  Bushman  ;  spend  several  months  at  his  station  before  you 
hazard  your  capital;  take  with  you  a  temper  to  bear  every- 
thing and  sigh  for  nothing;  put  your  whole  heart  in  what  you 
are  about ;  never  call  upon  Hercules  when  your  cart  sticks  in 
the  rut,  and,  whether  you  feed  sheep  or  breed  cattle,  your  suc- 
cess is  but  a  question  of  time. 

But,  whatever  I  owed  to  nature,  I  owed  also  something  to 
fortune.  I  bought  my  sheep  at  a  little  more  than  Is.  each. 
AVhen  I  left,  none  were  worth  less  than  155.,  and  the  fat  sheep 
were  worth  £l.*  I  had  an  excellent  shepherd,  and  my  whole 
care,  night  and  day,  was  the  improvement  of  the  flock.  I  was 
fortunate,  too,  in  entering  Australia  before  the  system  miscall- 
ed "  The  "\Vakefield"f  had  diminished  the  supply  of  labour,  and 

getic,  contented  disposition,  with  a  good  flow  of  animal  spirits,  who  had  been 
bred  in  luxury  and  refinement,  succeed  better  than  men  bred  as  farmers,  who 
were  always  hankering  after  bread  and  beer,  and  market  ordinaries  of  Old 
England.  .  .  .  To  be  dreaming  when  you  should  be  looking  after  your 
cattle  is  a  terrible  drawback.  .  .  .  There  are  certain  persons  who,  too 
lazy  and  too  extravagant  to  succeed  in  Europe,  sail  for  Australia  under  the 
idea  that  fortunes  are  to  be  made  there  by  a  sort  of  legerdemain,  spend  or 
lose  their  capital  in  a  very  short  space  of  time,  and  return  to  England  to 
abuse  the  place,  the  people,  and  everything  connected  with  colonization." — 
Sidney's  Australian  Handbook — admirable  for  its  wisdom  and  compactness. 

*  Lest  this  seem  an  exaggeration,  I  venture  to  annex  an  extract  from  a 
.MS.  letter  to  the  author  from  Mr.  George  Blakeston  Wilkinson,  author  of 
South  A  ustralia. 

"I  will  instance  the  case  of  one  person,  who  had  been  a  farmer  in  England, 
and  emigrated  with  about  £2000  about  seven  years  since.  On  his  arrival,  he 
found  that  the  price  of  sheep  had  fallen  from  about  30s.  to  5s.  or  6s.  per  head, 
and  he  bought  some  well-bred  flocks  at  these  prices.  lie  was  fortunate  in  ob- 
taining a  good  and  extensive  run,  and  he  devoted  the  whole  of  his  time  to  im- 
proving his  Hocks,  and  encouraged  his  shepherds  by  rewards ;  so  that,  in  about 
lour  years,  his  original  number  of  sheep  had  increased  from  2500  (which  cost 
him  £700)  to  7000  ;  and  the  breed  and  wool  were  also  so  much  improved, 
that  he  could  obtain  £1  per  head  for  2000  fat  sheep,  and  15s.  per  head  for 
the  other  5000,  and  ibis  at  a  time  when  the  general  price  of  sheep  was  from 
10*.  to  16*.  This  alone  increased  bis  original  capital,  invested  in  sheep,  from 
£700  to  £6700.  The  profits  from  the  wool  paid  the  whole  of  his  expenses 
and  wages  for  bis  men." 

f  I  felt  sure  from  the  first  that  the  system  called  "The  Wakefield"  could 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  473 

raised  the  price  of  land.  When  the  change  came  (like  most 
of  those  with  large  allotments  and  surplus  capital),  it  greatly 
increased  the  value  of  my  own  property,  though  at  the  cost  of 
a  terrible  blow  on  the  general  interests  of  the  colony.  I  was 
lucky,  too,  in  the  additional  venture  of  a  cattle  station,  and  in 
the  breed  of  horses  and  herds,  which,  in  the  five  years  devoted 
to  that  branch  establishment,  trebled  the  sum  invested  therein, 
exclusive  of  the  advantageous  sale  of  the  station.*  I  was 
lucky,  also,  as  I  have  stated,  in  the  purchase  and  resale  of 
lands,  at  Uncle  Jack's  recommendation.  And,  lastly,  I  left  in 
time,  and  escaped  a  very  disastrous  crisis  in  colonial  affairs, 
which  I  take  the  liberty  of  attributing  entirely  to  the  mischiev- 
ous crotchets  of  theorists  at  home,  who  want  to  set  all  clocks 
by  Greenwich  time,  forgetting  that  it  is  morning  in  one  part 
of  the  world  at  the  time  they  are  tolling  the  curfew  in  the 
other. 


CHAPTER  II. 

London  once  more  !  How  strange,  lone,  and  savage  I  feel 
in  the  streets !  I  am  ashamed  to  have  so  much  health  and 
strength,  when  I  look  at  those  slim  forms,  stooping  backs,  and 
pale  faces.  I  pick  my  way  through  the  crowd  with  the  mer- 
ciful timidity  of  a  good-natured  giant.  I  am  afraid  of  jostling 
against  a  man,  for  fear  the  collision  should  kill  him.  I  get  out 
of  the  way  of  a  thread-paper  clerk,  and  'tis  a  wonder  I  am  not 
run  over  by  the  omnibuses  ; — I  feel  as  if  I  could  run  over 
them !     I  perceive,  too,  that  there  is   something   outlandish, 

never  fairly  represent  the  ideas  of  Mr.  Wakefield  himself,  whose  singular 
breadth  of  understanding,  and  various  knowledge  of  mankind,  belied  the  no- 
tion that  fathered  on  him  the  clumsy  execution  of  a  theory  wholly  inapplica- 
ble to  a  social  state  like  Australia.  I  am  glad  to  see  that  he  has  vindicated 
himself  from  the  discreditable  paternity.  But  I  grieve  to  find  that  he  still 
clings  to  one  cardinal  error  of  the  system,  in  the  discouragement  of  small 
holdings,  and  that  he  evades,  more  ingeniously  than  ingenuously,  the  import- 
ant question — "What  should  be  the  minimum  price  of  land?" 

*  "The  profits  of  cattle-farming  are  smaller  than  those  of  the  sheepowner 
(if  the  latter  have  good  luck,  for  much  depends  upon  that),  but  cattle-farm- 
ing is  much  more  safe  as  a  speculation,  and  less  care,  knowledge,  and  man- 
agement are  required.  £2000,  laid  out  on  700  head  of  cattle,  if  good  runs  be 
procured,  might  increase  the  capital  in  five  years  from  £2000  to  £6000,  be- 
sides enabling  the  owner  to  maintain  himself,  pay  wages,  &c." — MS.  letter 
from  G.  B.  Wilkinson. 


17  1  THE    CAXTONS ! 

peregrinate,  and  lawless  abont  me.  Beau  Brummell  would 
certainly/  have  denied  me  all  pretensions  to  the  simple  air  of  a 
gentleman,  for  every  third  passenger  turns  back  to  look  at  me. 
I  retreat  to  my  hotel — send  for  bootmaker,  hatter,  tailor,  and 
hair-cutter.  I  humanize  myself  from  head  to  foot.  Even 
[Jlysses  is  obliged  to  have  recourse  to  the  arts  of  Minerva, 
and,  to  speak  unmet aphoiically,  "smarten  himself  up,"  before 
the  faithful  Penelope  condescends  to  acknowledge  him. 

The  artificers  promise  all  despatch.  Meanwhile,  I  hasten  to 
remake  acquaintance  with  my  mother  country  over  files  of  the 
Times,  Post,  Chronicle,  and  Herald.  Nothing  comes  amiss  to 
me,  but  articles  on  Australia  ;  from  those  I  turn  aside  with  the 
true  pshaw-supercilious  of  your  practical  man. 

No  more  are  leaders  filled  with  praise  and  blame  of  Trevan- 
ion.  "  Percy's  spur  is  cold."  Lord  Ulverstone  figures  only  in 
the  Court  Circular,  or  " Fashionable  Movements."  Lord  Ulver- 
stone entertains  a  royal  duke  at  dinner,  or  dines  in  turn  with  a 
royal  duke,  or  has  come  to  town,  or  gone  out  of  it.  At  most 
(faint  Platonic  reminiscence  of  the  former  life),  Lord  Ulver- 
stone says  in  the  House  of  Lords  a  few  words  on  some  ques- 
tion, not  a  party  one  ;  and  on  which  (though  affecting  perhaps 
the  interests  of  some  few  thousands,  or  millions,  as  the  case 
may  be)  men  speak  without  "  hears,"  and  are  inaudible  in  the 
gallery  ;  or  Lord  Ulverstone  takes  the  chair  at  an  agricultural 
meeting,  or  returns  thanks  when  his  health  is  drunk  at  a  din- 
ner at  Guildhall.  But  the  daughter  rises  as  the  father  sets, 
though  over  a  very  different  kind  of  world. 

"  First  ball  of  the  season  at  Castleton  House  !"  Long  de- 
scription of  the  rooms  and  the  company ;  above  all,  the  hostess. 
Lines  on  the  Marchioness  of  Castleton's  picture  in  the  "  Book 
of  Beauty,"  by  the  Hon.  Fitzroy  Fiddledum,  beginning  with 
"Art  thou  an  angel  from,"  &c. — a  paragraph  that  pleased  me 
more,  on  "Lady  Castleton's  Infant  School  at  Raby  Park;" 
then  again — "Lady  Castleton,  the  new  patroness  at  Almack's;" 
a  criticism  more  rapturous  than  ever  gladdened  living  poet,  on 
Lady  Cast  Id  oil's  superb  diamond  stomacher,  just  reset  by  StOrr 
and  Mortimer;  Westmacolt's  bust  of  Lady  Castleton  ;  Land- 
seer's  picture  of  Lady  Castleton  and  her  children,  in  the  cos- 
tume of  the  olden  time.  Not  a  month  in  that  long  file  of  the 
Morning  Post  but  what  Lady  Castleton  shone  forth  from  the 
resl  of  womankind — 


A   FAMILY   PICTURE.  475 

li Velut  inter  ignes 

Luna  m mores." 

The  blood  mounted  to  my  cheek.  \Yas  it  to  this  splendid 
constellation  in  the  patrician  heaven  that  my  obscure,  portion- 
less youth  had  dared  to  lift  its  presumptuous  eyes  ?  But  what 
is  this?  "Indian  Intelligence — Skilful  retreat  of  the  Sepoys 
under  Captain  de  Saxton !"  A  captain  already — what  is  the 
date  of  the  newspaper  ? — three  months  ago.  The  leading  ar- 
ticle quotes  the  name  with  high  praise.  Is  there  no  leaven  of 
envy  amidst  the  joy  at  my  heart  ?  How  obscure  has  been  my 
career — how  laurelless  my  poor  battle  with  adverse  fortune  ! 
Fie,  Pisistratus  !  I  am  ashamed  of  thee.  Has  this  accursed 
Old  World,  with  its  feverish  rivalries,  diseased  thee  already  ? 
Get  thee  home,  quick,  to  the  arms  of  thy  mother,  the  embrace 
of  thy  father — hear  Roland's  low  blessing,  that  thou  hast  help- 
ed to  minister  to  the  very  fame  of  that  son.  If  thou  wilt  have 
ambition,  take  it,  not  soiled  and  foul  with  the  mire  of  London. 
Let  it  spring  fresh  and  hardy  in  the  calm  air  of  wisdom  ;  and 
fed,  as  with  dews,  by  the  loving  charities  of  Home. 


CHAPTER  III. 

It  was  at  sunset  that  I  stole  through  tne  ruined  courtyard, 
having  left  my  chaise  at  the  foot  of  the  hill  below.  Though 
they  whom  I  came  to  seek  knew  that  I  had  arrived  in  England, 
they  did  not,  from  my  letter,  expect  me  till  the  next  day.  I 
had  stolen  a  inarch  upon  them ;  and  now,  in  spite  of  all  the 
impatience  which  had  urged  me  thither,  I  was  afraid  to  enter 
— afraid  to  see  the  change  more  than  ten  years  had  made  in 
those  forms,  for  which,  in  my  memory,  Time  had  stood  still. 
And  Roland  had,  even  when  we  parted,  grown  old  before  his 
time.  Then,  my  father  was  in  the  meridian  of  life,  now  he  had 
approached  to  the  decline.  And  my  mother,  whom  I  remem- 
bered so  fair,  as  if  the  freshness  of  her  own  heart  had  preserved 
the  soft  bloom  to  the  cheek  —  I  could  not  bear  to  think  that 
she  was  no  longer  young.  Blanche,  too,  whom  I  had  left  a 
child — Blanche,  my  constant  correspondent  during  those  long 
years  of  exile,  in  letters  crossed  and  recrossed,  with  all  the 
small  details  that  make  the  eloquence  of  letter- writing,  so  that 
in  those  epistles  I  had  seen  her  mind  gradually  grow  up  in 


r;r,  the  caxtons: 

harmony  with  the  very  characters;  at  first  vague  and  infan- 
tine— then  Bomewhal  st  iff  with  the  first  graces  of  running  hand, 
then  dashing  off,  free  and  facile;  and,  for  the  last  year  before  I 
left,  bo  formed,  yet  so  airy — so  regular,  yet  so  unconscious  of 
effort — though,  in  truth,  as  the  calligraphy  had  become  thus 
matured,  I  had  been  half  vexed  and  half  pleased  to  perceive  a 
certain  reserve  creeping  over  the  style — wishes  for  my  return 
less  expressed  from  herself  than  as  messages  from  others; 
words  of  the  old  child-like  familiarity  repressed ;  and  "  Dear- 
est Sisty"  abandoned  for  the  cold  form  of  "  Dear  Cousin." 
Those  letters,  coming  to  me  in  a  spot  where  maiden  and  love 
had  been  as  myths  of  the  bygone,  phantasms  and  eidola,  only 
vouchsafed  to  the  visions  of  fancy,  had,  by  little  and  little, 
crept  into  secret  corners  of  my  heart ;  and  out  of  the  wrecks 
of  a  former  romance,  solitude  and  reverie  had  gone  far  to  build 
up  the  fairy  domes  of  a  romance  yet  to  come.  My  mother's 
letters  had  never  omitted  to  make  mention  of  Blanche — of  her 
forethought  and  tender  activity,  of  her  warm  heart  and  sweet 
temper  —  and,  in  many  a  little  home  picture,  presented  her 
image  where  I  wTould  fain  have  placed  it,  not  "  crystal  seeing," 
but  joining  my  mother  in  charitable  visits  to  the  village,  in- 
structing the  young,  and  tending  on  the  old,  or  teaching  her- 
self to  illuminate,  from  an  old  missal  in  my  father's  collection, 
that  she  might  surprise  my  uncle  with  a  new  genealogical  ta- 
ble, with  all  shields  and  quarterings,  blazoned  or,  sable  and 
argent ;  or  flitting  round  my  father  where  he  sat,  and  watch- 
ing when  he  looked  round  for  some  book  he  was  too  lazy  to 
rise  for.  Blanche  had  made  a  new  catalogue,  and  got  it  by 
heart,  and  knew  at  once  from  what  corner  of  the  Heraclea  to 
summon  the  ghost.  On  all  these  little  traits  had  my  mother 
been  eulogistically  minute ;  but  somehow  or  other  she  had 
never  said,  at  least  for  the  last  two  years,  whether  Blanche 
was  pretty  or  plain.  That  was  a  sad  omission.  I  had  longed 
jusl  to  ask  that  simple  question,  or  to  imply  it  delicately  and 
diplomatically;  but  I  know  not  why,  I  never  dared  —  for 
Blanche  would  have  been  sure  to  have  read  the  letter,  and 
whal  business  was  it  of  mine?  And  if  she  was  ugly,  what 
question  more  awkward  both  to  put  and  to  answer?  Now, 
in  childhood,  Blanche  had  just  one  of  those  faces  that  might 
become  very  lovely  in  youth,  and  would  yet  quite  justify  the 
suspicion  that  it   might  become  gryphonesque,  witch-like,  and 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  477 

grim.  Yes,  Blanche,  it  is  perfectly  true !  If  those  large,  seri- 
ous black  eyes  took  a  fierce  light  instead  of  a  tender — if  that 
nose,  which  seemed  then  undecided  whether  to  be  straight  or 
to  be  aquiline,  arched  off  in  the  latter  direction,  and  assumed 
the  martial,  Roman,  and  imperative  character  of  Roland's  man- 
ly proboscis — if  that  face,  in  childhood  too  thin,  left  the  blushes 
of  youth  to  take  refuge  on  two  salient  peaks  by  the  temples 
(Cumberland  air,  too,  is  famous  for  the  growth  of  the  cheek- 
bone !) — if  all  that  should  happen,  and  it  very  well  might,  then, 
O  Blanche,  I  wish  thou  hadst  never  written  me  those  letters  ; 
and  I  might  have  done  wiser  things  than  steel  my  heart  so  ob- 
durately to  pretty  Ellen  Bolding's  blue  eyes  and  silk  shoes. 
Now,  combining  together  all  these  doubts  and  apprehensions, 
wonder  not,  O  reader,  why  I  stole  so  stealthily  through  the 
ruined  courtyard,  crept  round  to  the  other  side  of  the  tower, 
gazed  wistfully  on  the  sunsetting  slant,  on  the  high  casements 
of  the  hall  (too  high,  alas!  to  look  within),  and  shrunk  yet  to 
enter ; — doing  battle,  as  it  were,  with  my  heart. 

Steps !  one's  sense  of  hearing  grows  so  quick  in  the  Bush- 
land  ! — steps,  though  as  light  as  ever  brushed  the  dew  from 
the  harebell !  I  crept  under  the  shadow  of  the  huge  buttress 
mantled  with  ivy.  A  form  comes  from  the  little  door  at  an 
angle  in  the  ruins — a  woman's  form.  Is  it  my  mother  ?  It  is 
too  tall,  and  the  step  is  more  bounding.  It  winds  round  the 
building,  it  turns  to  look  back,  and  a  sweet  voice — a  voice 
strange,  yet  familiar,  calls,  tender  but  chiding,  to  a  truant  that 
lags  behind.  Poor  Juba!  he  is  trailing  his  long  ears  on  the 
ground ;  he  is  evidently  much  disturbed  in  his  mind ;  now  he 
stands  still,  his  nose  in  the  air.  Poor  Juba!  I  left  thee  so  slim 
and  so  nimble, 

"Thy  form  that  was  fashioned  as  light  as  a  fay's, 
Has  assumed  a  proportion  more  round ;" 

years  have  sobered  thee  strangely,  and  made  thee  obese  and 
Primmins-like. — They  have  taken  too  good  care  of  thy  crea- 
ture comforts,  O  sensual  Mauritanian  !  still,  in  that  mystic  in- 
telligence we  call  instinct,  thou  art  chasing  something  that 
years  have  not  swept  from  thy  memory.  Thou  art  deaf  to 
thy  lady's  voice,  however  tender  and  chiding.  That's  right, 
come  near — nearer — my  cousin  Blanche ;  let  me  have  a  fair 
look  at  thee.  Plague  take  the  dog !  he  flies  off  from  her :  he 
has  found  the  scent,  he  is  making  up  to  the  buttress !    Now — 


478  the  CAxroxfi : 

pounce — lie  is  caughl  ! — whining  ongallant  discontent.  Shall 
I  not  yet  Bee  the  face !  it  is  buried  in  Juba's  black  curls.  Kiss- 
es tool  Wicked  Blanche]  to  waste  on  a  dumb  animal  what, I 
heartily  hope,  many  a  good  Christian  would  be  exceedingly 
glad  of!  Juba  Btruggles  in  vain,  and  is  borne  oft'!  I  don't 
think  that  those  eyes  can  have  taken  the  fierce  turn,  and  Ro- 
land's eagle  nose  can  never  go  with  that  voice,  which  has  the 
coo  of  the  dove. 

I  leave  my  hiding-place,  and  steal  after  the  Voice  and  its 
owner.  Where  can  she  be  going  ?  Not  far.  She  springs  up 
the  hill  whereon  the  lords  of  the  castle  once  administered  jus- 
tice,— that  hill  which  commands  the  land  far  and  wide,  and 
from  which  can  be  last  caught  the  glimpse  of  the  westering 
sun.  How  gracefully  still  is  that  attitude  of  wistful  repose! 
Into  what  delicate  curves  do  form  and  drapery  harmoniously 
flow  !  How  softly  distinct  stands  the  lithe  image  against  the 
purple  hues  of  the  sky !  Then  again  comes  the  sweet  voice, 
gay  and  carolling  as  a  bird's — now  in  snatches  of  song,  now  in 
playful  appeals  to  that  dull,  four-footed  friend.  She  is  telling 
him  something  that  must  make  the  black  ears  stand  on  end, 
for  I  just  catch  the  words,  "  He  is  coming,"  and  "  home." 

I  cannot  see  the  sun  set  where  I  lurk  in  my  ambush,  amidst 
the  brake  and  the  ruins;  but  I  feel  that  the  orb  has  passed 
from  the  landscape,  in  the  fresher  air  of  the  twilight,  in  the 
deeper  silence  of  eve.  Lo  !  Ilesper  comes  forth ;  at  his  signal, 
star  after  star,  come  the  hosts — 

"  Ch'eran  con  ltd,  qnando  l'araor  divino, 
Mosse  da  prima  quelle  cose  belle  !" 

And  the  sweet  voice  is  hushed. 

Then  slowly  the  watcher  descends  the  hill  on  the  opposite 
side — the  form  escapes  from  my  view.  "What  charm  has  gone 
from  the  twilight?  See,  again,  where  the  step  steals  through 
the  ruins  and  along  the  desolate  court.  Ah  !  deep  and  true 
heart,  do  I  divine  the  remembrance  that  leads  thee?  I  pass 
through  the  wicket,  down  the  dell,  skirt  the  laurels,  and  be- 
hold the  face,  looking  up  to  the  stars — the  face  which  had  nest- 
led to  my  breast  in  the  sorrow  of  parting  years,  long  years 
ago:  on  the  grave  where  we  had  Bat,  1  the  boy,  thou  the  in- 
fant— there,*  >  Blanche!  is  thy  fair  face — (fairerthan  the  fondesl 
dream  thai  had  gladdened  my  exile) — vouchsafed  to  my  gaze! 

"  Blanche,  my  cousin  ! — again,  again — soul  with  soul,  amidsl 
'  be  d<  ad  !     Look  up,  Blanche  ;  ii  i-  [." 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  479 


CHAPTER  IV. 

"  Go  in. first  and  prepare  them,  dear  Blanche ;  I  will  wait  by 
the  door.     Leave  it  ajar,  that  I  may  see  them." 

Roland  is  leaning  against  the  wall — old  armour  suspended 
over  the  gray  head  of  the  soldier.  It  is  but  a  glance  that  I 
give  to  the  dark  cheek  and  high  brow ;  no  change  there  for 
the  worse — no  new  sign  of  decay.  Rather,  if  anything,  Ro- 
land seems  younger  than  when  I  left.  Calm  is  the  brow — no 
shame  on  it  now,  Roland ;  and  the  lips,  once  so  compressed, 
smile  with  ease — no  struggle  now,  Roland,  "  not  to  complain." 
A  glance  shows  me  all  this. 

"Papae !"  says  my  father,  and  I  hear  the  fall  of  a  book,  "I 
can't  read  a  line.  He  is  coming  to-morrow  ! — to-morrow  !  If 
we  lived  to  the  age  of  Methuselah,  Kitty,  we  could  never  rec- 
oncile philosophy  and  man ;  that  is,  if  the  poor  man's  to  be 
plagued  with  a  good,  affectionate  son !" 

And  my  father  gets  up  and  walks  to  and  fro.  One  minute 
more,  father — one  minute  more — and  I  am  on  thy  breast ! 
Time,  too,  has  dealt  gently  with  thee,  as  he  doth  with  those 
for  whom  the  wild  passions  and  keen  cares  of  the  world  never 
sharpen  his  scythe.  The  broad  front  looks  more  broad,  for  the 
locks  are  more  scanty  and  thin ;  but  still  not  a  furrow. 

Whence  comes  that  short  sigh  ? 

"  What  is  really  the  time,  Blanche  ?  Did  you  look  at  the 
turret  clock  ?     Well,  just  go  and  look  again." 

"  Kitty,"  quoth  my  father,  "  you  have  not  only  asked  what 
time  it  is  thrice  within  the  last  ten  minutes,  but  you  have  got 
my  watch,  and  Roland's  great  chronometer,  and  the  Dutch 
clock  out  of  the  kitchen,  all  before  you,  and  they  all  concur  in 
the  same  tale — to-day  is  not  to-morrow." 

"They  are  all  wrong,  I  know,"  said  my  mother,  with  mild 
firmness ;  "  and  they've  never  gone  right  since  he  left." 

Now  comes  out  a  letter — for  I  hear  the  rustle — and  then  a 
step  glides  towards  the  lamp  ;  and  the  dear,  gentle,  womanly 
face — fair  still,  fair  ever  for  me,  fair  as  when  it  bent  over  my 
pillow,  in  childhood's  first  sickness,  or  when  we  threw  flowers 


480  THE   CAXTOXM 

at  each  other  on  the  lawn,  at  sunny  noon  !  And  now  Blanche 
is  whispering;  and  now  the  flutter,  the  start,  the  cry — "It  is 

true!  it  is  true!  Your  arms,  mother.  Close,  close  round  my 
neck,  as  in  the  old  time.  Father  !  Roland,  too !  Oh,  joy !  joy ! 
joy !  home  again — home  till  death !" 


CHAPTER  V. 

From  a  dream  of  the  Bushland,  howling  dingoes,*  and  the 
war-whoop  of  the  wild  men,  I  wake  and  see  the  sun  shining  in 
through  the  jasmine  that  Blanche  herself  has  had  trained  round 
the  window — old  school-books,  neatly  ranged  round  the  wall 
. — fishing-rods,  cricket-bats,  foils,  and  the  old-fashioned  gun — 
and  my  mother  seated  by  the  bedside — and  Juba  whining  and 
scratching  to  get  up.  Had  I  taken  thy  murmured  blessing, 
my  mother,  for  the  whoop  of  the  blacks,  and  Juba's  low  whine 
for  the  howl  of  the  dingoes  ? 

Then  what  days  of  calm  exquisite  delight ! — the  interchange 
of  heart  with  heart ;  what  walks  with  Roland,  and  tales  of  him 
once  our  shame,  now  our  pride ;  and  the  art  with  which  the 
old  man  would  lead  those  walks  round  by  the  village,  that 
some  favourite  gossips  might  stop  and  ask,  "  What  news  of  his 
brave  young  honour  ?" 

I  strive  to  engage  my  uncle  in  my  projects  for  the  repair  of 
the  ruins — for  the  culture  of  those  wide  bogs  and  moorlands : 
why  is  it  that  he  turns  away  and  looks  down  embarrassed? 
Ah,  I  guess !  his  true  heir  now  is  restored  to  him.  He  cannot 
consent  that  I  should  invest  this  dross,  for  which  (the  Great 
Book  once  published)  I  have  no  other  use,  in  the  house  and  the 
lands  that  will  pass  to  his  son.  Neither  would  he  suffer  me  so 
to  invest  even  his  son's  fortune,  the  bulk  of  which  I  still  hold 
in  trust  for  that  son.  True,  in  his  career,  my  cousin  may  re- 
quire to  have  his  money  always  forthcoming.  But  7",  who  have 
no  career, — pooh  !  these  scruples  will  rob  me  of  half  the  pleas- 
ure my  years  of  toil  were  to  purchase.  I  must  contrive  it 
somehow  or  other:  what  if  he  would  let  me  house  and  moor- 
land on  a  long  improving  lease  ?  Then,  for  the  rest,  there  is  a 
pretty  little  property  to  be  sold  close  by,  on  which  I  can  re- 
tin-,  when  my  cousin,  as  heir  of  the  family,  comes,  perhaps  with 
*  Dingoes — the  name  given  by  Australian  natives  to  the  wild  do 


A   FAMILY    PICTUEE.  481 

a  wife,  to  reside  at  the  Tower.  I  must  consider  of  all  this,  and 
talk  it  over  with  Bolt,  when  my  mind  is  at  leisure  from  happi- 
ness to  turn  to  such  matters ;  meanwhile  I  fall  back  on  my  fa- 
vourite proverb, — "  Where  there's  a  will  there's  a  way" 

What  smiles  and  tears,  and  laughter  and  careless  prattle  with 
my  mother,  and  roundabout  questions  from  her,  to  know  if  I 
had  never  lost  my  heart  in  the  Bush  ?  and  evasive  answers 
from  me,  to  punish  her  for  not  letting  out  that  Blanche  was  so 
charming.  "  I  fancied  Blanche  had  grown  the  image  of  her 
father,  who  has  a  fine  martial  head  certainly,  but  not  seen  to 
advantage  in  petticoats !  How  could  you  be  so  silent  with  a 
theme  so  attractive  ?" 

"  Blanche  made  me  promise." 

Why,  I  wonder.     Therewith  I  fell  musing. 

What  quiet  delicious  hours  are  spent  with  my  father  in  his 
study,  or  by  the  pond,  where  he  still  feeds  the  carps,  that  have 
grown  into  Cyprinidian  leviathans.  The  duck,  alas !  has  de- 
parted this  life — the  only  victim  that  the  Grim  King  has  car- 
ried off;  so  I  mourn,  but  am  resigned  to  that  lenient  composi- 
tion of  the  great  tribute  to  Nature.  I  am  sorry  to  say  the 
Great  Book  has  advanced  but  slowly — by  no  means  yet  fit  for 
publication,  for  it  is  resolved  that  it  shall  not  come  out  as  first 
proposed,  a  part  at  a  time,  but  totus,  teres,  atque  rotundus. 
The  matter  has  spread  beyond  its  original  compass ;  no  less 
than  five  volumes — and  those  of  the  amplest — will  contain  the 
History  of  Human  Error.  However,  we  are  far  in  the  fourth, 
and  one  must  not  hurry  Minerva. 

My  father  is  enchanted  with  Uncle  Jack's  "  noble  conduct,'1 
as  he  calls  it ;  but  he  scolds  me  for  taking  the  money,  and  doubts 
as  to  the  propriety  of  returning  it.  In  these  matters  my  fa- 
ther is  quite  as  Quixotical  as  Roland.  I  am  forced  to  call  in 
my  mother  as  umpire  between  us,  and  she  settles  the  matter 
at  once  by  an  appeal  to  feeling.  "  Ah,  Austin !  do  you  not 
humble  me,  if  you  are  too  proud  to  accept  what  is  due  to  you 
from  my  brother !" 

"  Velit,  nolit,  quod  arnica"  answered  my  father,  taking  off* 
and  rubbing  his  spectacles — "  which  means,  Kitty,  that  when  a 
man's  married  he  has  no  will  of  his  own.  To  think,"  added 
Mr.  Caxton,  musingly,  "  that  in  this  world  one  cannot  be  sure 
of  the  simplest  mathematical  definition !  You  see,  Pisistratus, 
that  the  angles  of  a  triangle  so  decidedly  scalene  as  your  Uncle 

X 


482  ill  l:   CAXT0N6  : 

Jack's,  may  be  equal  to  the  angles  of  a  right-angled  triangle, 
after  all!"* 

The  Long  privation  of  books  has  quite  restored  all  my  appe- 
tite for  them.  IIow  much  I  have  to  pick  up! — what  a  com- 
pendious scheme  of  reading  I  and  my  father  chalk  out!  I  see 
enough  to  fill  up  all  the  leisure  of  life.  But,  somehow  or  other, 
Greek  and  Latin  stand  still:  nothing  charms  me  like  Italian. 
Blanche  and  I  are  reading  Metastasio,  to  the  great  indignation 
of  my  father,  who  calls  it  "  rubbish,"  and  wants  to  substitute 
Dante.     I  have  no  associations  at  present  with  the  souls 

"Che  son  contenti 
Ncl  fuoco ;" 
I  am  already  one  of  the  "beate  gentc?  Yet,  in  spite  of  Metas- 
tasio,  Blanche  and  I  are  not  so  intimate  as  cousins  ought  to  be. 
If  we  are  by  accident  alone,  I  become  as  silent  as  a  Turk, — as 
formal  as  Sir  Charles  Grandison.  I  caught  myself  calling  her 
Miss  Blanche  the  other  day. 

I  must  not  forget  thee,  honest  Squills ! — nor  thy  delight  at 
my  health  and  success ;  nor  thy  exclamation  of  pride  (one  hand 
on  my  pulse  and  the  other  griping  hard  the  "  ball"  of  my  arm). 
"  It  all  comes  of  my  citrate  of  iron ;  nothing  like  it  for  children ; 
it  has  an  effect  on  the  cerebral  developments  of  hope  and  com- 
bativeness."  Nor  can  I  wholly  omit  mention  of  poor  Mrs. 
Primmins,  who  still  calls  me  "Master  Sisty,"  and  is  breaking 
her  heart  that  I  will  not  wear  the  new  flannel  waistcoats  she 
had  such  pleasure  in  making — "Young  gentlemen  just  grow- 
ing up  are  so  apt  to  go  off  in  a  galloping  'sumption  !"  "  She 
knewr  just  such  another  as  Master  Sisty,  when  she  lived  at 
Torquay,  who  wasted  away,  and  went  out  like  a  snuff,  all  be- 
cause  he  would  not  wear  flannel  waistcoats."  Therewith  my 
mother  looks  grave,  and  says,  "  One  can't  take  too  much  pre- 
caution." 

Suddenly  the  whole  neighbourhood  is  thrown  into  commo- 
tion.    Trevanion — I  beg  his  pardon,  Lord  Ulverstone — is  com- 

*  Not  having  again  to  advert  to  Uncle  Jack,  I  may  be  pardoned  for  in- 
forming the  reader,  by  way  of  annotation,  that  lie  continues  to  prosper  sur- 
prisingly in  Australia,  though  the  Tibbets'  Wheal  stands  still  for  want  of 

workmen.  Despite  of  a  few  upS  ami  downs,  I  ha\c  had  no  fear  of  his  success 
until  this  year  (1849),  when  I  tremble  to  think  what  eifect  the  discovery  of 
the  gold  niiin-  in  California  may  have  on  his  lively  imagination.  If  thou 
c-< lapesf  thai  snari .  Urn  Le  Jack,  r<  s  <"/< .  tutus  en's, — thou  ait  safe  for  life  ! 


A   FAMILY    PICTURE.  483 

ing  to  settle  for  good  at  Compton.  Fifty  hands  are  employed 
daily  in  putting  the  grounds  into  hasty  order.  Fourgons,  and 
wagons,  and  vans  have  disgorged  all  the  necessaries  a  great 
man  requires,  where  he  means  to  eat,  drink,  and  sleep ;  books, 
wines,  pictures,  furniture.  I  recognize  my  old  patron  still.  He 
is  in  earnest,  whatever  he  does.  I  meet  my  friend,  his  steward, 
who  tells  me  that  Lord  Ulverstone  finds  his  favourite  seat,  near 
London,  too  exposed  to  interruption ;  and  moreover,  that,  as 
he  has  there  completed  all  improvements  that  wealth  and  en- 
ergy can  effect,  he  has  less  occupation  for  agricultural  pursuits, 
to  which  he  has  grown  more  and  more  partial,  than  on  the 
wide  and  princely  domain  which  has  hitherto  wanted  the  mas- 
ter's eye.  "He  is  a  bra'  farmer,  I  know,"  quoth  the  steward, 
"  so  far  as  the  theory  goes ;  but  I  don't  think  we  in  the  north 
want  great  lords  to  teach  us  how  to  follow  the  pleugh."  The 
steward's  sense  of  dignity  is  hurt ;  but  he  is  an  honest  fellow, 
and  really  glad  to  see  the  family  come  to  settle  in  the  old 
place. 

They  have  arrived,  and  with  them  the  Castletons,  and  a  whole 
2^osse  comitatus  of  guests.  The  county  paper  is  full  of  fine 
names. 

"  What  on  earth  did  Lord  Ulverstone  mean  by  pretending 
to  get  out  of  the  way  of  troublesome  visitors  ?" 

"My  dear  Pisistratus,"  answered  my  father  to  that  excla- 
mation, "  it  is  not  the  visitors  who  come,  but  the  visitors  who 
stay  away,  that  most  trouble  the  repose  of  a  retired  minister. 
In  all  the  procession,  he  sees  but  the  images  of  Brutus  and 
Cassius — that  are  not  there !  And  depend  on  it,  also,  a  retire- 
ment so  near  London  did  not  make  noise  enough.  You  see,  a 
retiring  statesman  is  like  that  fine  carp — the  farther  he  leaps 
from  the  water,  the  greater  splash  he  makes  in  falling  into  the 
weeds !  But,"  added  Mr.  Caxton,  in  a  repentant  tone,  "  this 
jesting  does  not  become  us ;  and,  if  I  indulged  it,  it  is  only 
because  I  am  heartily  glad  that  Trevanion  is  likely  now  to 
find  out  his  true  vocation.  And  as  soon  as  the  fine  people  he 
brings  with  him  have  left  him  alone  in  his  library,  I  trust  he 
will  settle  to  that  vocation,  and  be  happier  than  he  has  been 

yet." 

"And  that  vocation,  sir,  is — ?" 

"  Metaphysics !"  said  my  father.  "  He  will  be  quite  at  home 
in  puzzling  over  Berkeley,  and  considering  whether  the  Speak- 


184  the  caxtons: 

cr's  chair,  and  the  official  red  boxes,  were  really  tilings  whose 
ideas  <>f  figure,  extension,  and  hardness,  were  all  in  the  mind, 
h  will  be  a  -rent  consolation  to  him  to  agree  with  Berkeley, 

and  to  iind  that  he  has  only  been  baffled  by  immaterial  phan- 
tasms I" 

My  father  was  quite  right.  The  repining,  subtle,  truth- 
weighing  Trevanion,  plagued  by  his  conscience  into  seeing  all 
si<ks  of  a  question  (for  the  least  question  has  more  than  two 
sides,  and  is  hexagonal  at  least),  was  much  more  fitted  to  dis- 
cover the  origin  of  ideas  than  to  convince  Cabinets  and  Nations 
that  two  and  two  make  four — a  proposition  on  which  he  him- 
self would  have  agreed  with  Abraham  Tucker,  where  that 
most  ingenious  and  suggestive  of  all  English  metaphysicians 
observes,  "  Well  persuaded  as  I  am  that  two  and  two  make 
four,  if  I  were  to  meet  with  a  person  of  credit,  candour,  and 
understanding,  who  should  sincerely  call  it  in  question,  I  would 
give  him  a  hearing;  for  I  am  not  more  certain  of  that  than  of 
the  whole  being  greater  than  a  part.  And  yet  I  could  myself 
suggest  some  considerations  that  might  seem  to  controvert  this 
pobit."*  I  can  so  well  imagine  Trevanion  listening  to  "  some 
person  of  credit,  candour,  and  understanding,"  in  disproof  of 
that  vulgar  proposition  that  twice  two  make  four !  But  the 
news  of  this  arrival,  including  that  of  Lady  Castleton,  disturb- 
ed me  greatly,  and  I  took  to  long  wanderings  alone.  In  one 
of  these  rambles,  they  all  called  at  the  Tower — Lord  and  Lady 
Ulverstone,  the  Castletons  and  their  children.  I  escaped  the 
visit ;  and  on  my  return  home,  there  was  a  certain  delicacy  re- 
specting old  associations  that  restrained  much  talk,  before  me, 
on  so  momentous  an  event.  Roland,  like  me,  had.  kept  out  of 
the  way.  Blanche,  poor  child,  ignorant  of  the  antecedents, 
was  the  most  communicative.  And  the  especial  theme  she  se- 
lected— was  the  grace  and  beauty  of  Lady  Castleton! 

A  pressing  invitation  to  spend  some  days  at  the  castle  had 
been  cordially  given  to  all.  It  was  accepted  only  by  myself: 
I  wrote  word  that  I  would  come. 

Yes;  I  longed  to  prove  the  strength  of  my  own  sclf-con- 
qnest,  and  accurately  test  the  nature  of  the  feelings  that  had 
disturbed  me.     That  any  sentiment  which  could  be  called  love 

*  Lir/Jit  of  Nature — chapter  on  Judgment. — See  the  very  ingenious  illustra- 
tion of  doubt,  "whether  the  part  is  always  greater  than  the  whole" — taken 
from  time,  or  rather  etc ■rnil\ . 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  485 

remained  for  Lady  Castleton,  the  wife  of  another,  and  that 
other  a  man  with  so  many  claims  on  my  affection  as  her  lord, 
I  held  as  a  moral  impossibility.  But,  with  all  those  lively  im- 
pressions of  early  youth  still  engraved  on  my  heart — impres- 
sions of  the  image  of  Fanny  Trevanion  as  the  fairest  and  bright- 
est of  human  beings — could  I  feel  free  to  love  again  ?  Could 
I  seek  to  woo,  and  rivet  to  myself  for  ever,  the  entire  and  vir- 
gin affections  of  another,  while  there  was  a  possibility  that  I 
might  compare  and  regret  ?  No ;  either  I  must  feel  that,  if 
Fanny  were  again  single — could  be  mine  without  obstacle,  hu- 
man or  divine — she  had  ceased  to  be  the  one  I  would  single 
out  of  the  world ;  or,  though  regarding  love  as  the  dead,  I 
would  be  faithful  to  its  memory  and  its  ashes.  My  mother 
sighed  and*  looked  fluttered  and  uneasy  all  the  morning  of  the 
day  on  which  I  was  to  repair  to  Compton.  She  even  seemed 
cross,  for  about  the  third  time  in  her  life,  and  paid  no  compli- 
ment to  Mr.  Stultz,  when  my  shooting-jacket  was  exchanged 
for  a  black  frock,  which  that  artist  had  pronounced  to  be 
"  splendid ;"  neither  did  she  honour  me  with  any  of  those  little 
attentions  to  the  contents  of  my  portmanteau,  and  the  perfect 
"getting  up"  of  my  white  waistcoats  and  cravats,  which  made 
her  natural  instincts  on  such  memorable  occasions.  There  was 
also  a  sort  of  querulous,  pitying  tenderness  in  her  tone,  when 
she  spoke  to  Blanche,  which  was  quite  pathetic ;  though,  for- 
tunately, its  cause  remained  dark  and  impenetrable  to  the  in- 
nocent comprehension  of  one  who  could  not  see  where  the  past 
filled  the  urns  of  the  future  at  the  fountain  of  life.  My  father 
understood  me  better,  shook  me  by  the  hand  as  I  got  into  the 
chaise,  and  muttered,  out  of  Seneca- 


"Non  tanquam  transfuga,  sed  tanquam  explorator." 
"Not  to  desert,  but  examine." 

Quite  right. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

Agreeable  to  the  usual  custom  in  great  houses,  as  soon  as 
I  arrived  in  Compton,  I  was  conducted  to  my  room,  to  adjust 
my  toilet,  or  compose  my  spirits  by  solitude : — it  wanted  an 
hour  to  dinner.  I  had  not,  however,  been  thus  left  ten  min- 
utes, before  the  door  opened,  and  Trevanion  himself  (as  I  would 


486  the  caxtons  : 

fain  still  call  him)  stood  before  me.  Most  cordial  were  his 
greeting  and  welcome;  and,  seating  himself  by  my  side,  he 
continued  to  converse,  in  his  peculiar  way — bluntly  eloquent, 
and  carelessly  learned — till  the  halt-hour  bell  rang.  He  talked 
on  Australia,  the  Wakefield  system — cattle — books,  his  trouble 
in  arranging  his  library — his  schemes  for  improving  his  prop- 
erty, and  embellishing  his  grounds — his  delight  to  find  my  fa- 
ther look  so  well — his  determination  to  see  a  great  deal  of  him, 
whether  his  old  college  friend  would  or  not.  He  talked,  in 
short,  of  everything  except  politics,  and  his  own  past  career — 
showing  only  his  soreness  in  that  silence.  But  (independently 
of  the  mere  work  of  time)  he  looked  yet  more  worn  and  jaded 
in  his  leisure  than  he  had  done  in  the  full  tide  of  business ;  and 
his  former  abrupt  quickness  of  manner  seemed  now.  to  partake 
of  feverish  excitement.  I  hoped  that  my  father  would  see 
much  of  him,  for  I  felt  that  the  weary  mind  wanted  soothing. 

Just  as  the  second  bell  rang,  I  entered  the  drawing-room. 
There  were  at  least  twenty  guests  present — each  guest,  no 
doubt,  some  planet  of  fashion  or  fame,  with  satellites  of  its 
own.  But  I  saw  only  two  forms  distinctly;  first,  Lord  Cas- 
tleton,  conspicuous  with  star  and  garter — somewhat  ampler 
and  portlier  in  proportions,  and  with  a  frank  dash  of  gray  in 
the  silky  waves  of  his  hair ;  but  still  as  pre-eminent  as  ever  for 
that  beauty — the  charm  of  which  depends  less  than  any  other 
upon  youth — arising,  as  it  does,  from  a  felicitous  combination 
of  bearing  and  manner,  and  that  exquisite  suavity  of  expres- 
sion which  steals  into  the  heart,  and  pleases  so  much  that  it 
becomes  a  satisfaction  to  admire  !  Of  Lord  Castleton,  indeed, 
it  might  be  said,  as  of  Alcibiades,  "that  he  was  beautiful  at 
every  age."  I  felt  my  breath  come  thick,  and  a  mist  passed 
before  my  eyes,  as  Lord  Castleton  led  me  through  the  crowd, 
and  the  radiant  vision  of  Fanny  Trevanion,  how  altered — and 
how  dazzling! — burst  upon  me. 

I  felt  the  light  touch  of  that  hand  of  snow;  but  no  guilty 
thrill  shot  through  my  veins.  I  heard  the  voice  musical  as 
ever — lower  than  it  was  once,  and  more  subdued  in  its  key, 
but  steadfast  and  untremulous — it  was  no  longer  the  voice  that 
made  "my  soul  plant  itself  in  the  ears/'*  The  event  was  over, 
and  I  knew  that  the  dream  had  lied  from  the  waking  world 
for  evei-. 

*    Sir  Philip  Sidney. 


A    FAMILY   PICTURE.  487 

"  Another  old  friend !"  as  Lady  Ulverstone,  came  forth  from 
a  little  group  of  children,  leading  one  fine  boy  of  nine  years 
old,  while  one,  two  or  three  years  younger,  clung  to  her  gown. 
"  Another  old  friend ! — and,"  added  Lady  Ulverstone,  after  the 
first  kind  greetings,  "  two  new  ones  when  the  old  are  gone." 
The  slight  melancholy  left  the  voice,  as,  after  presenting  to  me 
the  little  Viscount,  she  drew  forward  the  more  bashful  Lord 
Albert,  who  indeed  had  something  of  his  grandsire's  and  name- 
sake's look  of  refined  intelligence  in  his  brow  and  eyes. 

The  watchful  tact  of  Lord  Castleton  was  quick  in  terminat- 
ing whatever  embarrassment  might  belong  to  these  introduc- 
tions,  as,  leaning  lightly  on  my  arm,  he  drew  me  forward,  and 
presented  me  to  the  guests  more  immediately  in  our  neigh- 
bourhood, who  seemed  by  their  earnest  cordiality  to  have  been 
already  prepared  for  the  introduction. 

Dinner  was  now  announced,  and  I  welcomed  that  sense  of 
relief  and  segregation  with  which  one  settles  hito  one's  own 
"particular"  chair  at  your  large  miscellaneous  entertainment. 

I  stayed  three  days  at  that  house.  How  truly  had  Trevan- 
ion  said  that  Fanny  would  make  "  an  excellent  great  lady." 
What  perfect  harmony  between  her  manners  and  her  position ; 
just  retaining  enough  of  the  girl's  seductive  gaiety  and  be- 
witching desire  to  please,  to  soften  the  new  dignity  of  bearing 
she  had  unconsciously  assumed — less,  after  all,  as  a  great  lady, 
than  as  wife  and  mother :  with  a  fine  breeding,  perhaps  a  little 
languid  and  artificial,  as  compared  with  her  lord's — which 
sprang,  fresh  and  healthful,  wholly  from  nature — but  still  so 
void  of  all  the  chill  of  condescension,  or  the  subtle  impertinence 
that  belongs  to  that  order  of  the  inferior  noblesse,  which  boasts 
the  name  of  "  exclusives ;"  with  what  grace,  void  of  prudery, 
she  took  the  adulation  of  the  flatterers,  turning  from  them  to 
her  children,  or  escaping  lightly  to  Lord  Castleton,  with  an 
ease  that  drew  round  her  at  once  the  protection  of  hearth  and 
home. 

And  certainly  Lady  Castleton  was  more  incontestably  beau- 
tiful than  Fanny  Trevanion  had  been. 

All  this  I  acknowledged,  not  with  a  sigh  and  a  pang,  but  with 
a  pure  feeling  of  pride  and  delight.  I  might  have  loved  mad- 
ly and  presumptuously,  as  boys  will  do  ;  but  I  had  loved  wor- 
thily— the  love  left  no  blush  on  my  manhood ;  and  Fanny's 
very  happiness  wTas  my  perfect  and  total  cure  of  every  wound 


THE   CAXTONS  : 

in  my  heart  not  quite  scarred  over  before.  Had  she  been  dis- 
content nl,  Borrowful,  without  joy  in  the  ties  slie  had  formed, 
there  might  have  been  more  danger  that  J  should  brood  over 
the  past,  and  regret  the  loss  of  its  idol.  Here  there  was  none. 
And  tin'  very  improvement  in  her  beauty  had  so  altered  its 
character — so  altered — that  Fanny  Trevanion  and  Lady  Castle- 
tun  seemed  two  persons.  And,  thus  observing  and  listening 
to  her,  I  could  now  dispassionately  perceive  such  differences 
in  our  nature  as  seemed  to  justify  Trevanion's  assertion,  which 
once  struck  me  as  so  monstrous,  "that  we  should  not  have 
been  happy  had  fate  permitted  our  union."  Pure-hearted  and 
simple  though  she  remained  in  the  artificial  world,  still  that 
world  was  her  element;  its  interests  occupied  her;  its  talk, 
though  just  chastened  from  scandal,  flowed  from  her  lips.  To 
borrow  the  words  of  a  man  who  was  himself  a  courtier,  and 
one  so  distinguished  that  he  could  afford  to  sneer  at  Chester- 
field,* "  She  had  the  routine  of  that  style  of  conversation  which 
is  a  sort  of  gold  leaf,  that  is  a  great  embellishment  where  it  is 
joined  to  anything  else."  I  will  not  add,  "but  makes  a  very 
poor  figure  by  itself," — for  that  Lady  Castleton's  conversation 
certainly  did  not  do — perhaps,  indeed,  because  it  was  not  "by 
itself" — and  the  gold  leaf  was  all  the  better  for  being  thin, 
since  it  could  not  cover  even  the  surface  of  the  sweet  and 
amiable  nature  over  which  it  was  spread.  Still  this  was  not 
the  mind  in  which  now,  in  maturer  experience,  I  would  seek 
to  find  sympathy  with  manly  action,  or  companionship  in  the 
charms  of  intellectual  leisure. 

There  was  about  this  same  beautiful  favourite  of  nature  and 
fortune  a  certain  helplessness,  which  had  even  its  grace  in  that 
high  station,  and  which,  perhaps,  tended  to  insure  her  domes- 
tic peace,  for  it  served  to  attach  her  to  those  who  had  Avon 
influence  over  her,  and  was  happily  accompanied  by  a  most 
affectionate  disposition  'But  still,  if  less  favoured  by  circum- 
Btances,  less  sheltered  from  every  wind  that  could  visit  her 
too  roughly — if,  as  the  wile  of  aman  of  inferior  rank,  she  had 
failed  of  that  high  seat  and  silken  banopy  reserved  for  the  spoil- 
ed darlings  of  fortune — that  helplessness  might  have  become 
querulous.  I  thought  of  poor  Ellen  Bolding  and  her  silken 
shoes.  Fanny  Trevanion  seemed  to  have  come  into  the  world 
with  silk  shoes — not  to  walk  where  there  was  a  stone  or  a 
*  Lobd  Bervey's  M<  iiHt'irs  of  George  IT. 


A   FAMILY    PICTUKE.  489 

brier !  I  heard  something,  in  the  gossip  of  those  around,  that 
confirmed  this  view  of  Lady  Castleton's  character,  while  it 
deepened  my  admiration  of  her  lord,  and  showed  me  how  wise 
had  been  her  choice,  and  how  resolutely  he  had  prepared  him- 
self to  vindicate  his  own.  One  evening  as  I  was  sitting,  a  lit- 
tle apart  from  the  rest,  with  two  men  of  the  London  world, 
to  whose  talk — for  it  ran  upon  the  on  clits  and  anecdotes  of  a 
region  long  strange  to  me — I  was  a  silent  but  amused  listener ; 
one  of  the  two  said — "  Well,  I  don't  know  anywhere  a  more 
excellent  creature  than  Lady  Castleton ;  so  fond  of  her  chil- 
dren— and  her  tone  to  Castleton  so  exactly  what  it  ought  to 
be — so  affectionate,  and  yet,  as  it  were,  respectful.  And  the 
more  credit  to  her,  if,  as  they  say,  she  was  not  in  love  with 
him  when  she  married  (to  be  sure,  handsome  as  he  is,  he  is 
twice  her  age) !  And  no  woman  could  have  been  more  flat- 
tered and  courted  by  Lotharios  and  lady-killers  than  Lady 
Castleton  had  been.  I  confess,  to  my  shame,  that  Castleton's 
luck  puzzles  me,  for  it  is  rather  an  exception  to  my  general 
experience." 

"  My  dear  *  *  *,"  said  the  other,  who  was  one  of  those  wise 
men  of  pleasure,  who  occasionally  startle  us  into  wondering 
how  they  came  to  be  so  clever,  and  yet  rest  contented  with 
mere  drawing-room  celebrity — men  who  seem  always  idle,  yet 
appear  to  have  read  everything ;  always  indifferent  to  what 
passes  before  them,  yet  who  know  the  character  and  divine  the 
secrets  of  everybody — "  my  dear  *  *  *,"  said  the  gentleman, 
"  you  would  not  be  puzzled  if  you  had  studied  Lord  Castleton 
instead  of  her  ladyship.  Of  all  the  conquests  ever  made  by 
Sedley  Beaudesert,  when  the  two  fairest  dames  of  the  Fau- 
bourg are  said  to  have  fought  for  his  smiles,  in  the  Bois  de 
Boulogne — no  conquest  ever  cost  him  such  pains,  or  so  taxed 
his  knowledge  of  women,  as  that  of  his  wife  after  marriage ! 
He  was  not  satisfied  with  her  hand  he  was  resolved  to  have 
her  whole  heart,  £  one  entire  ancLpenect  chrysolite ;'  and  he 
has  succeeded !  Never  was  husband  so  watchful,  and  so  little 
jealous — never  one  who  confided  so  generously  in  all  that  was 
best  in  his  wife,  yet  was  so  alert  in  protecting  and  guarding 
her,  wherever  she  was  weakest !  When,  in  the  second  year 
of  marriage,  that  dangerous  German  Prince  Von  Leibenfels  at- 
tached himself  so  perseveringly  to  Lady  Castleton,  and  the 
scandal-mongers  pricked  up  their  ears,  in  hopes  of  a  victim,  I 

X2 


490  the  caxtons: 

watched  CastletOD  with  as  much  interest  as  if  I  had  been  look- 
in--  over  Deschappelles  playing  at  chess.  You  never  saw  any- 
thing so  masterly;  he  pitted  himself  against  his  highness  with 
the  cool  confidence,  not  of  a  blind  spouse,  but  a  fortunate  rival. 
He  surpassed  him  in  the  delicacy  of  his  attentions,  he  outshone 
him  by  his  careless  magnificence.  Leibenfels  had  the  imperti- 
nence to  send  Lady  Castleton  a  bouquet  of  some  rare  flowers 
just  in  fashion.  Castleton,  an  hour  before,  had  filled  her 
whole  balcony  with  the  same  costly  exotics,  as  if  they  were 
too  common  for  nosegays,  and  only  just  worthy  to  bloom  for 
her  a  day.  Young  and  really  accomplished  as  Leibenfels  is, 
Castleton  eclipsed  him  by  his  grace,  and  fooled  him  with  his 
wit ;  he  laid  little  plots  to  turn  his  moustache  and  guitar  into 
ridicule;  he  seduced  him  into  a  hunt  with  the  buckhounds 
(though  Castleton  himself  had  not  hunted  before,  since  he  was 
thirty),  and  drew  him,  spluttering  German  oaths,  out  of  the 
slough  of  a  ditch;  he  made  him  the  laughter  of  the  clubs;  he 
put  him  fairly  out  of  fashion — and  all  with  such  suavity  and 
politeness,  and  bland  sense  of  superiority,  that  it  was  the  finest 
piece  of  high  comedy  you  ever  beheld.  The  poor  prince,  who 
had  been  coxcomb  enough  to  lay  a  bet  with  a  Frenchman  as 
to  his  success  with  the  English  in  general,  and  Lady  Castleton 
in  particular,  went  away  with  a  face  as  long  as  Don  Quixote's. 

If  you  had  but  seen  him  at  S House,  the  night  before  he 

took  leave  of  the  island,  and  his  comical  grimace  when  Castle- 
ton "offered  him  a  pinch  of  the  Beaudesert  mixture !  No !  the 
fact  is,  that  Castleton  made  it  the  object  of  his  existence,  the 
masterpiece  of  his  art,  to  secure  to  himself  a  happy  home,  and 
the  entire  possession  of  his  wife's  heart.  The  first  two  or 
three  years,  I  fear,  cost  him  more  trouble  than  any  other  man 
ever  took,  with  his  own  wife  at  least ;  but  he  may  now  rest  in 
peac< — Lady  Castleton  is  won,  and  for  ever." 

As  my  gentleman  ceased,  Lord  Castleton's  noble  head  rose 
above  the  group  standing  round  him;  and  1  saw  Lady  Castle- 
ton turn  with  a  look  of  well-bred  fatigue  from  a  handsome 
young  fop,  who  had  affected  to  lower  his  voice  while  he  spoke 
to  her,  and,  encountering  the  eyes  of  her  husband,  the  look 
changed  at  once  into  one  of  such  sweet  smiling  affection,  such 
frank,  unmistakable  wife-like  pride,  that  it  seemed  a  response 
to  the  assertion — "Lady  Castleton  is  won,  and  for  ever." 

Yes,  that  story  increased  my  admiration  for  Lord  Castleton  : 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  491 

it  showed  me  with  what  forethought  and  earnest  sense  of  re- 
sponsibility he  had  undertaken  the  charge  of  a  life,  the  guid- 
ance of  a  character  yet  undeveloped:  it  lastingly  acquitted  him 
of  the  levity  that  had  been  attributed  to  Sedley  Beaudesert. 
But  I  felt  more  than  ever  contented  that  the  task  had  devolved 
on  one  whose  temper  and  experience  had  so  fitted  him  to  dis- 
charge it.  That  German  prince  made  me  tremble  from  sym- 
pathy with  the  husband,  and  in  a  sort  of  relative  shudder  for 
myself!  Had  that  episode  happened  to  me,  I  could  never  have 
drawn  "  high  comedy"  from  it ! — I  could  never  have  so  happi- 
ly closed  the  fifth  act  with  a  pinch  of  the  Beaudesert  mixture ! 
No,  no ;  to  my  homely  sense  of  man's  life  and  employment, 
there  was  nothing  alluring  in  the  prospect  of  watching  over 
the  golden  tree  in  the  garden,  with  a  "  woe  to  the  Argus  if 
Mercury  once  lull  him  to  sleep  !"  Wife  of  mine  shall  need  no 
watching,  save  in  sickness  and  sorrow !  Thank  Heaven  that 
my  way  of  life  does  not  lead  through  the  roseate  thorough- 
fares, beset  with  German  princes  laying  bets  for  my  perdition, 
and  fine  gentlemen  admiring  the  skill  with  which  I  play  at 
chess  for  so  terrible  a  stake !  To  each  rank  and  each  temper, 
its  own  laws.  I  acknowledge  that  Fanny  is  an  excellent  mar- 
chioness, and  Lord  Castleton  an  incomparable  marquess.  But, 
Blanche  !  if  I  can  win  thy  true,  simple  heart,  I  trust  I  shall  be- 
gin at  the  fifth  act  of  high  comedy,  and  say  at  the  altar — 
"  Once  won,  won  for  ever." 


CHAPTER  YII. 

I  eode  home  on  a  horse  my  host  lent  me ;  and  Lord  Castle- 
ton rode  part  of  the  way  with  me,  accompanied  by  his  two 
boys,  who  bestrode  manfully  their  Shetland  ponies,  and  can- 
tered on  before  us.  I  paid  some  compliment  to  the  spirit  and 
intelligence  of  these  children  —  a  compliment  they  well  de- 
served. 

"  Why,  yes,"  said  the  Marquess,  with  a  father's  becoming 
pride,  "  I  hope  neither  of  them  will  shame  his  grandsire,  Tre- 
vanion.  Albert  (though  not  quite  the  wonder  poor  Lady 
Ulverstone  declares  him  to  be)  is  rather  too  precocious ;  and 
it  is  all  I  can  do  to  prevent  his  being  spoilt  by  flattery  to  his 
cleverness,  which,  I  think,  is  much  worse  than  even  flattery  to 


492  THE   CAXTONB  ! 

rank  —  a  danger  to  which,  despite  Albert's  destined  inherit- 
ance,  the  elder  brother  is  more  exposed.  Eton  soon  takes  ont 
the  conceit  of  the  Latter  and  more  vulgar  kind.     I  remember 

Lord (you  know  what  an   unpretending,  good-natured 

fellow  he  is  now)  strutting  into  the  play-ground,  a  raw  boy, 
with  his  chin  up  in  the  air,  and  burly  Dick  Johnson  (rather  a 
1  nit -hunter  now,  I'm  afraid)  coming  up  and  saying,  'Well,  sir, 

and  who  the  deuce  are  you?'      'Lord ,'  says  the  poor 

devil  unconsciously,  '  eldest   son   of  the   Marquess   of .' 

k()h,  indeed!'  cries  Johnson;  'then,  there's  one  kick  for  my 
lord,  and  two  for  the  marquess !'     I  am  not  fond  of  kicking, 

but  I  doubt  if  anything  ever  did more  good  than  those 

three  kicks  !  But,"  continued  Lord  Castleton,  "  when  one  flat- 
ters a  boy  for  his  cleverness,  even  Eton  itself  cannot  kick  the 
conceit  out  of  him.  Let  him  be  last  in  the  form,  and  the  great- 
est dunce  ever  flogged,  there  are  always  people  to  say  that 
your  public  schools  don't  do  for  your  great  geniuses.  And  it 
is  ten  to  one  but  what  the  father  is  plagued  into  taking  the 
boy  home,  and  giving  him  a  private  tutor,  who  fixes  him  into 
a  prig  for  ever.  A  coxcomb  in  dress,"  said  the  Marquess, 
smiling,  "  is  a  trifler  it  would  ill  become  me  to  condemn,  and  I 
own  that  I  would  rather  see  a  youth  a  fop  than  a  sloven ;  but  a 
coxcomb  in  ideas — why,  the  younger  he  is,  the  more  unnatural 
and  disagreeable.     Now,  Albert,  over  that  hedge,  sir." 

"  That  hedge,  papa?     The  pony  will  never  do  it." 

"Then,"  said  Lord  Castleton,  taking  off  his  hat  with  polite- 
ness, "  I  fear  you  will  deprive  us  of  the  pleasure  of  your  com- 
pany." 

The  boy  laughed,  and  made  gallantly  for  the  hedge,  though 
I  saw  by  his  change  of  colour  that  it  a  little  alarmed  him.  The 
pony  could  not  clear  the  hedge ;  but  it  was  a  pony  of  tact  and 
resources,  and  it  scrambled  through  like  a  cat,  inflicting  sundry 
rents  and  tears  on  a  jacket  of  Raphael  blue. 

Lord  Castleton  said,  smiling,  "  You  see,  I  teach  them  to  get 
through  a  difficulty  one  way  or  the  other.  Between  you  and 
me,"  he  added,  seriously,  "I  perceive  a  very  different  world 
arising  around  the  next  generation  from  that  in  which  I  lirst 
went  forth  and  took  my  pleasure.  I  shall  rear  my  boys  accord- 
ingly. Rich  noblemen  musl  now-a-daysoe  useful  men;  and  if 
they  can't  leap  over  briers,  they  must  scramble  through  them. 
Don'1  yon  agree  with  me  ?" 


A    FAMILY   PICTUKE.  493 

"  Yes,  heartily." 

"Marriage  makes  a  man  much  wiser,"  said  the  Marquess, 
after  a  pause.  "  I  smile  now,  to  think  how  often  I  sighed  at 
the  thought  of  growing  old.  Now  I  reconcile  myself  to  the 
gray  hairs  without  dreams  of  a  wig,  and  enjoy  youth  still — 
for,"  pointing  to  his  sons,  "  it  is  there  /" 

"He  has  very  nearly  found  out  the  secret  of  the  saffron  bag 
now,"  said  my  father,  pleased  and  rubbing  his  hands,  when  I 
repeated  this  talk  with  Lord  Castleton.  "  But  I  fear  poor  Tre- 
vanion,"  he  added,  with  a  compassionate  change  of  counte- 
nance, "  is  still  far  away  from  the  sense  of  Lord  Bacon's  re- 
ceipt. And  his  wife,  you  say,  out  of  very  love  for  him,  keeps 
always  drawing  discord  from  the  one  jarring  wire." 

"  You  must  talk  to  her,  sir." 

"  I  will,"  said  my  father,  angrily ;  "  and  scold  her  too — fool- 
ish woman !  I  shall  tell  her  Luther's  advice  to  the  Prince  of 
Anhalt," 

"  What  was  that,  sir  ?" 

"  Only  to  throw  a  baby  into  the  river  Maldon,  because  it  had 
sucked  dry  five  wet-nurses  besides  the  mother,  and  must  there- 
fore be  a  changeling.  Why,  that  ambition  of  hers  would  suck 
dry  all  the  mother's  milk  in  the  genus  mammalian.  And  such 
a  withered,  rickety,  malign  little  changeling,  too !  She  shall 
fling  it  into  the  river,  by  all  that  is  holy !"  cried  my  father ; 
and,  suiting  the  action  to  the  word,  away  into  the  pond  went 
the  spectacles  he  had  been  rubbing  indignantly  for  the  last 
three  minutes.  "  Papae  !"  faltered  my  father,  aghast,  while  the 
Cyprinidre,  mistaking  the  dip  of  the  spectacles  for  an  invitation 
to  dinner,  came  scudding  up  to  the  bank.  "  It  is  all  your  fault," 
said  Mr.  Caxton,  recovering  himself.  "  Get  me  the  new  tor- 
toise-shell spectacles  and  a  large  slice  of  bread.  You  see  that 
when  fish  are  reduced  to  a  pond  they  recognize  a  benefactor, 
which  they  never  do  when  rising  at  flies,  or  groping  for  worms, 
in  the  waste  world  of  a  river.  Hem  ! — a  hint  for  the  Ulver- 
stones.  Besides  the  bread  and  the  spectacles,  just  look  out 
and  bring  me  the  old  black-letter  copy  of  St.  Anthony's  Ser- 
mon to  Fishes.'''' 


494  i HE  «  a\ton>: 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

Some  weeks  now  have  passed  since  my  return  to  the  Tower: 
the  Castletons  are  gone,  and  all  Trevanion's  gay  guests.  And 
since  these  departures,  visits  between  the  two  houses  have 
been  interchanged  often,  and  the  bonds  of  intimacy  are  grow- 
ing close.  Twice  has  my  father  held  long  conversations  apart 
with  Lady  Ulverstone  (my  mother  is  not  foolish  enough  to 
feel  a  pang  now  at  such  confidences),  and  the  result  has  be- 
come apparent.  Lady  Ulverstone  has  ceased  all  talk  against 
the  world  and  the  public — ceased  to  fret  the  galled  pride  of 
her  husband  with  irritating  sympathy.  She  has  made  herself 
the  true  partner  of  his  present  occupations,  as  she  was  of  those 
in  the  past;  she  takes  interest  in  farming,  and  gardens,  and 
flowers,  and  those  philosophical  peaches  which  come  from 
trees  academical  that  Sir  William  Temple  reared  in  his  grace- 
ful retirement.  She  does  more — she  sits  by  her  husband's 
side  in  the  library,  reads  the  books  he  reads,  or,  if  in  Latin, 
coaxes  him  into  construing  them.  Insensibly  she  leads  him 
into  studies  farther  and  farther  remote  from  Blue  Books  and 
Hansard ;  and,  taking  my  father's  hint, 

"Allures  to  brighter  worlds,  and  leads  the  way." 
They  are  inseparable.  Darby-and-Joan-like,  you  see  them  to- 
gether in  the  library,  the  garden,  or  the  homely  little  pony- 
phaeton,  for  which  Lord  L^lverstone  has  resigned  the  fast- 
trotting  cob,  once  identified  with  the  eager  looks  of  the  busy 
Trevanion.  It  is  most  touching,  most  beautiful !  And  to 
think  what  a  victory  over  herself  the  proud  woman  must  have 
obtained! — never  a  thought  that  seems  to  murmur,  never  a 
word  to  recall  the  ambitions  man  back  from  the  philosophy 
into  which  his  active  mind  flies  for  refuge.  And  with  the 
effort,  her  brow  has  become  so  serene!  That  care-worn  ex- 
pression,  which  her  fine  features  once  wore,  is  fast,  vanishing. 
And  what  affects  me  most  is  to  think  that  this  change  (which 
Is  already  settling  into  happiness)  lias  been  wrought  by  Aus- 
tin's counsels  and  appeals  to  her  sense  and  affection.  "It  is  to 
you,"  he  said,  "that  Trevanion  must  look  for  more  than  com- 


A   FAMILY    PICTUEE.  495 

fort — for  cheerfulness  and  satisfaction.  Your  child  is  gone 
from  you — the  world  ebbs  away — you  two  should  be  all  in  all 
to  each  other.  Be  so."  Thus,  after  paths  so  devious,  meet 
those  who  had  parted  in  youth,  now  on  the  verge  of  age. 
There,  in  the  same  scenes  where  Austin  and  Ellinor  had  first 
formed  acquaintance,  he,  aiding  her  to  soothe  the  wounds  in- 
flicted by  the  ambition  that  had  separated  their  lots,  and  both 
taking  counsel  to  insure  the  happiness  of  the  rival  she  had  pre- 
ferred. 

After  all  this  vexed  public  life  of  toil,  and  care,  and  ambition 
— to  see  Trevanion  and  Ellinor  drawing  closer  and  closer  to 
each  other,  knowing  private  life  and  its  charms  for  the  first 
time — verily,  it  would  have  been  a  theme  for  an  elegiast  like 
Tibullus. 

But  all  this  while  a  younger  love,  with  no  blurred  leaves  to 
erase  from  the  chronicle,  has  been  keeping  sweet  account  of 
the  summer  time.  "  Very  near  are  two  hearts  that  have  no 
guile  between  them,"  saith  a  proverb,  traced  back  to  Confu- 
cius. O  ye  days  of  still  sunshine,  reflected  back  from  our- 
selves— O  ye  haunts,  endeared  evermore  by  a  look,  tone,  or 
smile,  or  rapt  silence;  when  more  and  more  with  each  hour 
unfolded  before  me  that  nature,  so  tenderly  coy,  so  cheerful 
though  serious,  so  attuned  by  simple  cares  to  affection,  yet  so 
filled,  from  soft  musings  and  solitude,  with  a  poetry  that  gave 
grace  to  duties  the  homeliest — setting  life's  trite  things  to 
music !  Here  nature  and  fortune  concurred  alike ;  equal  in 
birth  and  pretensions — similar  in  tastes  and  in  objects — loving 
the  healthful  activity  of  purpose,  but  content  to  find  it  around 
us — neither  envying  the  wealthy  nor  vying  with  the  great; 
each  framed  by  temper  to  look  on  the  bright  side  of  life,  and 
find  founts  of  delight,  and  green  spots  fresh  with  verdure, 
where  eyes  but  accustomed  to  cities  could  see  but  the  sands 
and  the  mirage :  while  afar  (as  man's  duty)  I  had  gone  through 
the  travail  that,  in  wrestling  with  fortune,  gives  pause  to  the 
heart  to  recover  its  losses,  and  know  the  value  of  love,  in  its 
graver  sense  of  life's  earnest  realities ;  Heaven  had  reared,  at 
the  thresholds  of  home,  the  young  tree  that  should  cover  the 
roof  with  its  blossoms,  and  embalm  with  its  fragrance  the  daily 
air  of  my  being. 

It  had  been  the  joint  prayer  of  those  kind  ones  I  left,  that 
such  might  be  my  reward ;  and  each  had  contributed,  in  his 


496  Tin:  cantons  : 

or  her  several  May,  to  fit  that  fair  life  for  the  ornament  and 
joy  of  the  one  that  now  asked  to  guard  and  to  cherish  it. 
From  Roland  came  that  deep,  earnest  honour — a  man's  in  its 
strength,  and  a  woman's  in  its  delicate  sense  of  refinement. 
From  Roland,  that  quick  taste  for  all  things  noble  in  poetry, 
and  lovely  in  nature — the  eye  that  sparkled  to  read  how  Bay- 
ard stood  alone  at  the  bridge,  and  saved  an  army — or  wept 
over  the  page  that  told  how  the  dying  Sidney  put  the  bowl 
from  his  burning  lips.  Is  that  too  masculine  a  spirit  for  some? 
Let  each  please  himself.  Give  me  the  woman  who  can  echo 
all  thoughts  that  are  noblest  in  men !  And  that  eye,  too — 
like  Roland's — could  pause  to  note  each  finer  mesh  in  the  won- 
derful web  work  of  beauty.  No  landscape  to  her  was  the  same 
yesterday  and  to-day — a  deeper  shade  from  the  skies  could 
change  the  face  of  the  moors — the  springing  up  of  fresh  wild 
flowers,  the  very  song  of  some  bird  unheard  before,  lent  vari- 
ety to  the  broad  rugged  heath.  Is  that  too  simple  a  source 
of  pleasure  for  some  to  prize  ?  Be  it  so  to  those  who  need  the 
keen  stimulants  that  cities  afford.  But,  if  we  were  to  pass  all 
our  hours  in  those  scenes,  it  was  something  to  have  the  tastes 
which  own  no  monotony  in  Nature. 

All  this  came  from  Roland ;  and  to  this,  with  thoughtful 
wisdom,  my  father  had  added  enough  knowledge  from  books 
to  make  those  tastes  more  attractive,  and  to  lend  to  impulsive 
perception  of  beauty  and  goodness  the  culture  that  draws  finer 
essence  from  beauty,  and  expands  the  Good  into  the  Better  by 
heightening  the  site  of  the  survey ;  hers,  knowledge  enough 
to  sympathize  with  intellectual  pursuits,  not  enough  to  dispute 
on  man's  province — Opinion.  Still,  whether  in  nature  or  in 
lore,  still 

"  The  fairest  garden  in  her  looks, 
And  in  her  mind  the  choicest  books  !" 

And  yet,  thou  wise  Austin — and  thou,  Roland,  poet  that  never 
wrote  a  verse — yet  your  work  had  been  incomplete,  but  then 
Woman  stepped  in,  and  the  mother  gave  to  her  she  designed 
for  a  daughter  1  lie  last  finish  of  meek  everyday  charities — the 
mild  household  virtues — "the  soft  word  that  turneth  away 
wrath" — the  angelic  pity  for  man's  rougher  faults — the  patience 
that  bideth  its  time — and,  exacting  no  "  rights  of  woman," 
Bubjugates  us,  delighted,  to  the  invisible  thrall. 

Dost  thou  remember,  my  Blanche,  that  soft  summer  evening 


A   FAMILY   PICTUEE.  497 

when  the  vows  our  eyes  had  long  interchanged  stole  at  last 
from  the  lip  ?  Wife  mine !  come  to  my  side — look  over  me 
while  I  write  :  there,  thy  tears  (happy  tears  are  they  not, 
Blanche  ?)  have  blotted  the  page !  Shall  we  tell  the  world 
more  ?  Right,  my  Blanche ;  no  words  should  profane  the 
place  where  those  tears  have  fallen ! 

And  here  I  would  fain  conclude ;  but  alas,  and  alas !  that  I 
cannot  associate  with  our  hopes,  on  this  side  the  grave,  him 
who,  we  fondly  hoped  (even  on  the  bridal-day,  that  gave  his 
sister  to  my  arms),  would  come  to  the  hearth  where  his  place 
now  stood  vacant,  contented  with  glory,  and  fitted  at  last  for 
the  tranquil  happiness  which  long  years  of  repentance  and  trial 
had  deserved. 

Within  the  first  year  of  my  marriage,  and  shortly  after  a  gal- 
lant share  in  a  desperate  action,  which  had  covered  his  name 
with  new  honours,  just  when  we  were  most  elated,  in  the  blind- 
ed vanity  of  human  pride,  came  the  fatal  news !  The  brief 
career  was  run.  He  died,  as  I  knew  he  would  have  prayed  to 
die,  at  the  close  of  a  day  ever  memorable  in  the  annals  of  that 
marvellous  empire,  which  valour  without  parallel  has  annexed 
to  the  Throne  of  the  Isles.  He  died  in  the  arms  of  Victory, 
and  his  last  smile  met  the  eyes  of  the  noble  chief  who,  even  in 
that  hour,  could  pause  from  the  tide  of  triumph  by  the  victim 
it  had  cast  on  its  bloody  shore.  "  One  favour,"  faltered  the 
dying  man  ;  "  I  have  a  father  at  home — he,  too,  is  a  soldier. 
In  my  tent  is  my  will :  it  gives  all  I  have  to  him — he  can  take 
it  without  shame.  That  is  not  enough  !  Write  to  him — you 
— with  your  own  hand,  and  tell  him  how  his  son  fell !"  And 
the  hero  fulfilled  the  prayer,  and  that  letter  is  dearer  to  Roland 
than  all  the  long  roll  of  the  ancestral  dead !  Nature  has  re- 
claimed her  rights,  and  the  forefathers  recede  before  the  son. 

In  a  side  chapel  of  the  old  Gothic  church,  amidst  the  mould- 
ering tombs  of  those  who  fought  at  Acre  and  Agincourt,  a 
fresh  tablet  records  the  death  of  Heebeet  de  Caxtox,  with 
the  simple  inscription — 

HE   FELL    OX   THE   FIELD  I 

HIS    COEXTEY   MOEEXED    HIM, 

AXD    HIS    FATHEE   IS    EESIGXED. 

Years  have  rolled  away  since  that  tablet  was  placed  there, 


498  the  caxtonb: 

and  changes  have  passed  on  that  nook  of  earth  which  bounds 
our  little  world:  fair  chambers  have  sprung  up  amidst  the 
desolate  ruins;  Car  and  near,  smiling  corn-fields  replace  the 
bleak  dreary  moors.  The  land  supports  more  retainers  than 
ever  thronged  to  the  pennon  of  its  barons  of  old;  and -Roland 
can  look  from  his  Tower  over  domains  that  are  reclaimed,  year 
by  year,  from  the  waste,  till  the  ploughshare  shall  win  a  lord- 
ship more  opulent  than  those  feudal  chiefs  ever  held  by  the 
tenure  of  the  sword.  And  the  hospitable  mirth  that  had  fled 
from  the  ruin  has  been  renewed  in  the  hall;  and  rich  and  poor, 
great  and  lowly,  have  welcomed  the  rise  of  an  ancient  house 
from  the  dust  of  decay.  All  those  dreams  of  Roland's  youth 
are  fulfilled ;  but  they  do  not  gladden  his  heart  like  the  thought 
that  his  son,  at  the  last,  was  worthy  of  his  line,  and  the  hope 
that  no  gulf  shall  yawn  between  the  two  when  the  Grand  Cir- 
cle is  rounded,  and  man's  past  and  man's  future  meet  where 
Time  disappears.  Never  was  that  lost  one  forgotten ! — never 
was  his  name  breathed  but  tears  rushed  to  the  eyes ;  and,  each 
morning,  the  peasant  going  to  his  labour  might  see  Roland 
steal  down  the  dell  to  the  deep-set  door  of  the  chapel.  None 
presume  there  to  follow  his  steps,  or  intrude  on  his  solemn 
thoughts ;  for  there,  in  sight  of  that  tablet,  are  his  orisons 
made,  and  the  remembrance  of  the  dead  forms  a  part  of  the 
commune  with  heaven.  But  the  old  man's  step  is  still  firm, 
and  his  brow  still  erect ;  and  you  may  see  in  his  face  that  it 
was  no  hollow  boast  which  proclaimed  that  the  "father  was 
resigned:"  and  ye  who  doubt  if  too  Roman  a  hardness  might 
not  be  found  in  that  Christian  resignation,  think  what  it  is  to 
have  feared  for  a  son  the  life  of  shame,  and  ask  then,  if  the 
sharpest  grief  to  a  father  is  in  the  son's  death  of  honour! 

Years  have  passed,  and  two  fair  daughters  play  at  the  knees 
of  Blanche,  or  creep  round  the  footstool  of  Austin,  waiting 
patiently  for  the  expected  kiss  when  he  looks  up  from  the 
( *  reat  Book,  now  drawing  fast  to  its  close :  or,  if  Roland  enter 
the  room,  forget  all  their  sober  demureness,  and,  unawed  by 
the  terrible  "Papas!"  run  clamorous  for  the  promised  swing 
in  the  orchard,  or  the  fiftieth  recital  of  "Chevy  Chase." 

For  my  part,  I  lake  the  goods  the  gods  provide  me,  and  am 
contented  with  girls  that  have  the  eyes  of  their  mother;  but 
Roland,  ungrateful  man,  begins  to  grumble  that  we  are  so  neg- 
lectful of  the  rights  of  heirs-male.     He  is  in  doubt  whether 


A   FAMILY   PICTUKE.  499 

to  lay  the  fault  on  Mr.  Squills  or  on  us :  I  am  not  sure  that  he 
does  not  think  it  a  conspiracy  of  all  three  to  settle  the  repre- 
sentation of  the  martial  De  Caxtons  on  the  "  spindle  side." 
Whosoever  be  the  right  person  to  blame,  an  omission  so  fatal 
to  the  straight  line  in  the  pedigree  is  rectified  at  last,  and  Mrs. 
Primmins  again  rushes,  or  rather  rolls — in  the  movement  nat- 
ural to  forms  globular  and  spheral — into  my  father's  room, 
with — 

"  Sir,  sir — it  is  a  boy !" 

Whether  my  father  asked  also  this  time  that  question  so 
puzzling  to  metaphysical  inquirers,  "  What  is  a  boy  ?"  I  know 
not :  I  rather  suspect  he  had  not  leisure  for  so  abstract  a  ques- 
tion ;  for  the  whole  household  burst  on  him,  and  my  mother, 
in  that  storm  peculiar  to  the  elements  of  the  Mind  Feminine — 
a  sort  of  sunshiny  storm  between  laughter  and  crying — whirl- 
ed him  off  to  behold  the  JYeogilos. 

Now,  some  months  after  that  date,  on  a  winter's  evening,  we 
were  all  assembled  in  the  hall,  which  was  still  our  usual  apart- 
ment, since  its  size  permitted  to  each  his  own  segregated  and 
peculiar  employment.  A  large  screen  fenced  off  from  inter- 
ruption my  father's  erudite  settlement ;  and  quite  out  of  sight, 
behind  that  impermeable  barrier,  he  was  now  calmly  winding 
up  that  eloquent  peroration  which  will  astonish  the  world, 
whenever,  by  Heaven's  special  mercy,  the  printer's  devils  have 
done  with  "  The  History  of  Human  Error."  In  another  nook 
my  uncle  had  ensconced  himself — stirring  his  coffee  (in  the  cup 
my  mother  had  presented  to  him  so  many  years  ago,  and  which 
had  miraculously  escaped  all  the  ills  the  race  of  crockery  is 
heir  to),  a  volume  of  Ivanhoe  in  the  other  hand ;  and,  despite 
the  charm  of  the  Northern  Wizard,  his  eye  not  on  the  page. 
On  the  wall,  behind  him,  hangs  the  picture  of  Sir  Herbert  de 
Caxton,  the  soldier-comrade  of  Sidney  and  Drake ;  and,  at  the 
foot  of  the  picture,  Roland  has  slung  his  son's  sword  beside 
the  letter  that  spoke  of  his  death,  which  is  framed  and  glazed: 
sword  and  letter  had  become  as  the  last,  nor  least  honoured, 
Penates  of  the  hall : — the  son  was  grown  an  ancestor. 

Not  far  from  my  uncle  sat  Mr.  Squills,  employed  in  mapping- 
out  phrenological  divisions  on  a  cast  he  had  made  from  the 
skull  of  one  of  the  Australian  aborigines — a  ghastly  present 
which  (in  compliance  witli  a  yearly  letter  to  that  effect)  I  had 
brought  him  over,  together  with  a  stuffed  "  wombat"  and  a 


500  THE    CAXTONSI 

large  bundle  of  sarsaparilla.  (For  the  satisfaction  of  his  pa- 
tients, I  may  observe,  parenthetically,  that  the  skull  and  the 
"  wombat" — that  last  is  a  creature  between  a  miniature  pig 
and  a  very  small  badger — were  not  precisely  packed  up  with 
the  sarsaparilla!)  Farther  on  stood  open,  but  idle,  the  new 
pianoforte,  at  which,  before  my  father  had  given  his  prepara- 
tory hem,  and  sat  down  to  the  Great  Book,  Blanche  and  my 
mother  had  been  trying  hard  to  teach  me  to  bear  the  third  in 
the  glee  of  "The  Chough  and  Crow  to  roost  have  gone;" — vain 
task,  in  spite  of  all  nattering  assurances  that  I  have  a  very  fine 
"  bass,"  if  I  could  but  manage  to  humour  it.  Fortunately  for 
the  ears  of  the  audience,  that  attempt  is  now  abandoned.  My 
mother  is  hard  at  work  on  her  tapestry — the  last  pattern  in 
fashion — to  wit,  a  rosy-cheeked  young  troubadour  playing  the 
lute  under  a  salmon-coloured  balcony :  the  two  little  girls  look 
gravely  on,  prematurely  in  love,  I  suspect,  with  the  troubadour ; 
and  Blanche  and  I  have  stolen  away  into  a  corner,  which,  by 
some  strange  delusion,  we  consider  out  of  sight,  and  in  that 
corner  is  the  cradle  of  the  JVeogilos.  Indeed,  it  is  not  our 
fault  that  it  is  there — Roland  would  have  it  so ;  and  the  baby 
is  so  good,  too,  he  never  cries — at  least  so  say  Blanche  and  my 
mother :  at  all  events,  he  does  not  cry  to-night.  And,  indeed, 
that  child  is  a  wonder !  He  seems  to  know  and  respond  to 
what  was  uppermost  at  our  hearts  when  he  was  born ;  and  yet 
more,  when  Roland  (contrary,  I  dare  say,  to  all  custom)  per- 
mitted neither  mother,  nor  nurse,  nor  creature  of  womankind, 
to  hold  him  at  the  baptismal  font,  but  bent  over  the  new  Chris- 
tian his  own  dark,  high-featured  face,  reminding  one  of  the  ea- 
gle that  hid  the  infant  in  its  nest,  and  watched  over  it  with 
wings  that  had  battled  with  the  storm :  and  from  that  moment 
the  child,  who  took  the  name  of  Herbert,  seemed  to  recognize 
Roland  better  than  his  nurse,  or  even  mother — seemed  to  know 
that,  in  giving  him  that  name,  we  sought  to  give  Roland  his 
son  once  more !  Never  did  the  old  man  come  near  the  infant 
but  it  smiled,  and  crowed,  and  stretched  out  its  little  arms ; 
and  then  the  mother  and  I  would  press  each  other's  hand  se- 
cretly, and  were  not  jealous.  Well,  then,  Blanche  and  Pisis- 
tratua  were  seated  near  the  cradle,  and  talking  in  low  whis- 
pers, when  my  father  pushed  aside  the  screen  and  Baid — 

"  There — the  work  is  done ! — and  now  it  may  go  to  press  as 
soon  as  you  will." 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  501 

Congratulations  poured  in — my  father  bore  them  with  his 
usual  equanimity ;  and  standing  on  the  hearth,  his  hand  in  his 
waistcoat,  he  said,  musingly,  "  Among  the  last  delusions  of  Hu- 
man Error,  I  have  had  to  notice  Rousseau's  phantasy  of  Per- 
petual Peace,  and  all  the  like  pastoral  dreams,  which  preceded 
the  bloodiest  wars  that  have  convulsed  the  earth  for  more  than 
a  thousand  years !" 

"And  to  judge  by  the  newspapers,"  said  I,  "the  same  delu- 
sions are  renewed  again.  Benevolent  theorists  go  about  proph- 
esying peace  as  a  positive  certainty,  deduced  from  that  sibyl- 
book  the  ledger ;  and  we  are  never  again  to  buy  cannons,  pro- 
vided only  we  can  exchange  cotton  for  corn." 

Me,  Squills  (who,  having  almost  wholly  retired  from  gener- 
al business,  has,  for  want  of  something  better  to  do,  attended 
sundry  "Demonstrations  in  the  Xorth,"  since  which  he  has  talk- 
ed much  about  the  march  of  improvement,  the  spirit  of  the  age, 
and  "us  of  the  nineteenth  century"). — "I  heartily  hope  that 
those  benevolent  theorists  are  true  prophets.  I  have  found,  in 
the  course  of  my  professional  practice,  that  men  go  out  of  the 
world  quite  fast  enough,  without  hacking  them  into  pieces,  or 
blowing  them  up  into  the  air.     War  is  a  great  evil." 

Blanche  (passing  by  Squills,  and  glancing  towards  Roland). 
— "  Hush !" 

Roland  remains  silent. 

Mr.  Caxtox. — "  AVar  is  a  great  evil ;  but  evil  is  admitted  by 
Providence  into  the  agency  of  creation,  physical  and  moral. 
The  existence  of  evil  has  puzzled  wiser  heads  than  ours,  Squills. 
But,  no  doubt,  there  is  One  above  who  has  His  reasons  for  it. 
The  combative  bump  seems  as  common  to  the  human  skull  as 
the  philoprogenitive, — if  it  is  in  our  organization,  be  sure  it  is 
not  there  without  cause.  Neither  is  it  just  to  man,  nor  wisely 
submissive  to  the  Disposer  of  all  events,  to  suppose  that  war  is 
wholly  and  wantonly  produced  by  human  crimes  and  follies — 
that  it  conduces  only  to  ill,  and  does  not  as  often  arise  from 
the  necessities  interwoven  in  the  framework  of  society,  and 
speed  the  great  ends  of  the  human  race,  conformably  with  the 
designs  of  the  Omniscient.  Not  one  great  war  has  ever  deso- 
lated the  earth,  but  has  left  behind  it  seeds  that  have  ripened 
into  blessings  incalculable !" 

Mr.  Squills  (with  the  groan  of  a  dissentient  at  a  "Demon- 
stration").— "Oh!  oh!  oh!" 


>n_'  THE   CAXTONS  : 

Luckless  Squills  I  Little  could  he  have  foreseen  the  shower- 
bath,  or  rather  douche,  of  erudition  thai  fell  splash  on  his  head, 
as  he  pulled  the  string  with  that  impertinent  Oh  !  oh  !  Down, 
first  came  the  Persian  war,  with  Median  myriads  disgorging 

all  the  rivers  they  had  drunk  up  in  their  march  through  the 
East — all  the  arts,  all  the  letters,  all  the  sciences,  all  the  no- 
tions of  liberty  that  we  inherit  from  Greece — my  father  rushed 
on  with  them  all,  sousing  Squills  with  his  proofs  that,  without 
the  Persian  War,  Greece  would  never  have  risen  to  be  the 
teacher  of  the  world.  Before  the  gasping  victim  could  take 
breath,  down  came  Hun,  Goth,  and  Vandal,  on  Italy  and 
Squills. 

"What,  sir!"  cried  my  father,  "don't  you  see  that  from 
those  eruptions  on  demoralized  Rome  came  the  regeneration 
of  manhood ;  the  re-baptism  of  earth  from  the  last  soils  of  pa- 
ganism ;  and  the  remote  origin  of  whatever  of  Christianity  yet 
exists,  free  from  the  idolatries  with  which  Home  contaminated 
the  faith  ?" 

Squills  held  up  his  hands  and  made  a  splutter.  Down  came 
Charlemagne — paladins  and  all!  There  my  father  was  grand  ! 
What  a  picture  he  made  of  the  broken,  jarring,  savage  ele- 
ments of  barbaric  society.  And  the  iron  hand  of  the  great 
Frank — settling  the  nations  and  founding  existing  Europe. 
Squills  was  now  fast  sinking  into  coma  or  stupefaction;  but, 
catching  at  a  straw,  as  he  heard  the  word  "Crusades,"  he 
stuttered  forth,  "  Ah !  there  I  defy  you." 

"Defy  me  there!"  cries  my  father:  and  one  would  think 
the  ocean  was  in  the  shower-bath,  it  came  down  with  such  a 
rattle.  My  father  scarcely  touched  on  the  smaller  points  in 
excuse  for  the  Crusades,  though  he  recited  very  volubly  all 
the  humaner  arts  introduced  into  Europe  by  that  invasion  of 
the  East;  and  showed  how  it  had  served  civilization,  by  the 
rent  it  afforded  for  the  rude  energies  of  chivalry — by  the  ele- 
ment of  destruction  to  feudal  tyranny  that  it  introduced — by 
its  use  in  the  emancipation  of  burghs,  and  the  disrupture  of 
serfdom.  But  he  painted,  in  colours  vivid,  as  if  caught  from 
the  skies  of  the  East,  the  great  spread  of  Mohammedanism,  and 
the  danger  it  menaced  to  Christian  Europe — and  drew  up  the 
Godfreys,  and  Tancreds,  and  Richards,  as  a  league  of  the  Age 
and  Necessity,  againsi  the  terrible  progress  of  the  sword  and 
the  Koran.     "  Yon  call  them  madmen,"  cried  my  father,  "but 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  503 

the  frenzy  of  nations  is  the  statesmanship  of  fate!  How  know 
you  that — but  for  the  terror  inspired  by  the  hosts  who  marched 
to  Jerusalem — how  know  you  that  the  Crescent  had  not  waved 
over  other  realms  than  those  which  Koderic  lost  to  the  Moor  ? 
If  Christianity  had  been  less  a  passion,  and  the  passion  had 
less  stirred  up  all  Europe  —  how  know  you  that  the  creed 
of  the  Arab  (which  was  then,  too,  a  passion)  might  not  have 
planted  its  mosques  in  the  forum  of  Rome,  and  on  the  site 
of  Notre  Dame  ?  For  in  the  war  between  creeds — when  the 
creeds  are  embraced  by  vast  races — think  you  that  the  reason 
of  sages  can  cope  with  the  passion  of  millions  ?  Enthusiasm 
must  oppose  enthusiasm.  The  crusader  fought  for  the  tomb 
of  Christ,  but  he  saved  tl^e  life  of  Christendom." 

My  father  paused.  Squills  was  quite  passive ;  he  struggled 
no  more — he  was  drowned. 

"  So,"  resumed  Mr.  Caxton,  more  quietly — "  so,  if  later  Avars 
yet  perplex  us  as  to  the  good  that  the  All- wise  One  draws  from 
their  evils,  our  posterity  may  read  their  uses  as  clearly  as  we 
now  read  the  finger  of  Providence  resting  on  the  barrows  of 
Marathon,  or  guiding  Peter  the  Hermit  to  the  battle-fields  of 
Palestine.  Nor,  while  we  admit  the  evil  to  the  passing  gen- 
eration, can  we  deny  that  many  of  the  virtues  that  make  the 
ornament  and  vitality  of  peace  sprung  up  first  in  the  convul- 
sion of  Avar !"  Here  Squills  began  to  evince  faint  signs  of  re- 
suscitation, Avhen  my  father  let  fly  at  him  one  of  those  number- 
less waterworks  which  his  prodigious  memory  kept  in  constant 
supply.  "Hence,"  said  he,  "hence,  not  unjustly,  has  it  been 
remarked  by  a  philosopher,  shreAvd  at  least  in  worldly  experi- 
ence"— (Squills  again  closed  his  eyes,  and  became  exanimate) 
— "  '  it  is  strange  to  imagine  that  Avar,  which  of  all  things  ap- 
pears the  most  saA^age,  should  be  the  passion  of  the  most  he- 
roic spirits.  But  'tis  in  Avar  that  the  knot  of  felloAvship  is  clos- 
est drawn ;  'tis  in  Avar  that  mutual  succour  is  most  given — 
mutual  danger  run,  and  common  affection  most  exerted  and 
employed;  for  heroism  and  philanthropy  are  almost  one  and 
the  same !'  "* 

My  father  ceased,  and  mused  a  little.  Squills,  if  still  living, 
thought  it  prudent  to  feign  continued  extinction. 

"  Not,"  said  Mr.  Caxton,  resuming — "  not  but  what  I  hold 
it  our  duty  never  to  foster  into  a  passion  Avhat  Ave  must  rather 
*  Shaftesbury. 


504  the  CAXTONS  : 

sul unit  to  as  an  awful  necessity.  You  say  truly,  Mr.  Squills 
— war  is  an  evil ;  and  avoc  to  those  who,  on  slight  pretences, 
open  the  gates  of  Janus, 

'The  dire  abode, 

And  the  iicrce  issues  of  the  furious  god.'" 

Mr.  Squills,  after  a  long  pause — employed  in  some  of  the 
more  handy  means  for  the  reanimation  of  submerged  bodies, 
supporting  himself  close  to  the  fire  in  a  semi-erect  posture, 
with  gentle  friction,  self-applied,  to  each  several  limb,  and  co- 
pious recourse  to  certain  steaming  stimulants  which  my  corn- 
passionate  hands  prepared  for  him — stretches  himself,  and  says 
feebly,  "In  short,  then,  not  to  provoke  farther  discussion,  you 
would  go  to  war  in  defence  of  your  country.  Stop,  sir — stop, 
for  Heaven's  sake!  I  agree  Avith  you — I  agree  with  you! 
But,  fortunately,  there  is  little  chance  now  that  any  new  Boney 
will  build  boats  at  Boulogne  to  invade  us." 

Mb.  Caxton. —  "I  am  not  so  sure  of  that,  Mr.  Squills." 
(Squills  falls  back  with  a  glassy  stare  of  deprecating  horror.) 
"  I  don't  read  the  newspapers  very  often,  but  the  past  helps 
me  to  judge  of  the  present." 

Therewith  my  father  earnestly  recommended  to  Mr.  Squills 
the  careful  perusal  of  certain  passages  in  Thucydides,  just  pre- 
vious to  the  outbreak  of  the  Peloponnesian  war  (Squills  hast- 
ily nodded  the  most  servile  acquiescence),  and  drew  an  ingen- 
ious parallel  between  the  signs  and  symptoms  foreboding  that 
outbreak,  and  the  very  apprehension  of  coming  war  which  was 
evinced  by  the  recent  lopoeans  to  peace.*  And,  after  sundry 
notable  and  shrewd  remarks,  tending  to  show  where  elements 
for  war  were  already  ripening,  amidst  clashing  opinions  and 
disorganized  states,  he  wound  up  with  saying — "  So  that,  all 
things  considered,  I  think  Ave  had  better  just  keep  enough  of 
the  bellicose  spirit  not  to  think  it  a  sin  if  Ave  are  called  upon 
to  fight  for  our  pestles  and  mortars,  our  three  per  cents.,  goods, 
chattels,  and  liberties.  Such  a  time  must  come,  sooner  or  later, 
eA'en  though  the  Avhole  world  were  spinning  cotton,  and  print- 

*  When  this  work  was  first  published,  Mr.  Caxton  was  generally  deemed 
a  very  false,  prophet  in  these  anticipations,  and  sundry  critics  were  pleased  to 
consider  his  apology  for  war  neither  seasonable  nor  philosophical.  That  Mr. 
Caxton  was  right,  and  the  politicians  opposed  to  him  have  been  somewhat 
ludicrously  wrong,  may  be  briefly  accounted  for — Mr.  Caxton  had  read  his- 


A    FAMILY    PICTURE.  505 

ing  sprigged  calicoes.  We  may  not  see  it,  Squills,  but  that 
young  gentleman  in  the  cradle,  whom  you  have  lately  brought 
into  light,  may." 

"  And  if  so,"  said  my  uncle,  abruptly,  speaking  for  the  first 
time — "  if  indeed  it  be  for  altar  and  hearth  !"  My  father  sud- 
denly drew  in  and  pished  a  little,  for  he  saw  that  he  was  caught 
in  the  web  of  his  own  eloquence. 

Then  Roland  took  down  from  the  wall  his  son's  sword. 
Stealing  to  the  cradle,  he  laid  it  in  its  sheath  by  the  infant's 
side,  and  glanced  from  my  father  to  us  with  a  beseeching  eye. 
Instinctively  Blanche  bent  over  the  cradle,  as  if  to  protect  the 
JVeogiios;  but  the  child,  waking,  turned  from  her,  and,  attract- 
ed by  the  glitter  of  the  hilt,  laid  one  hand  lustily  thereon,  and 
pointed  with  the  other,  laughingly,  to  Roland. 

"  Only  on  my  father's  proviso,"  said  I,  hesitatingly.  "  For 
hearth  and  altar — nothing  less !" 

"  And  even  in  that  case,"  said  my  father,  "  add  the  shield  to 
the  sword !"  and  on  the  other  side  ol  the  infant  he  placed  Ro- 
land's well-worn  Bible,  blistered  in  many  a  page  with  secret 
tears. 

There  we  all  stood,  grouping  round  the  young  centre  of  so 
many  hopes  and  fears — in  peace  or  in  war,  born  alike  for  the 
Battle  of  Life.  And  he,  unconscious  of  all  that  made  our  lips 
silent,  and  our  eyes  dim,  had  already  left  that  bright  bauble 
of  the  sword,  and  thrown  both  arms  round  Roland's  bended 
neck. 

"Herbert  /"  murmured  Roland ;  and  Blanche  gently  drew 
away  the  sword — and  left  the  Bible. 

y 


THE    EXD. 


HARPER'S  WEEKLY. 

A  JOURNAL  OF  CIVILIZATION. 

21  Sxxst^dass  Illustrate  Tamils  Sfarospajttr. 

PRICE  FIVE  CENTS. 


Harper's  Weekly  has  now  been  in  existence  three  years.  Dur- 
ing that  period  no  effort  has  been  spared  to  make  it  the  best  possi- 
ble Family  Paper  for  the  American  People,  and  it  is  the  belief  of 
the  Proprietors  that,  in  the  peculiar  field  which  it  occupies,  no  ex- 
isting Periodical  can  compare  with  it. 

Every  Number  of  Harper's  Weekly  contains  all  the  News  of 
the  week,  Domestic  and  Foreign.  The  completeness  of  this  de- 
partment is,  it  is  believed,  unrivaled  in  any  other  weekly  publica- 
tion. Every  noteworthy  event  is  profusely  and  accurately  illustrated 
at  the  time  of  its  occurrence.  And  while  no  expense  is  spared  to 
procure  Original  Illustrations,  care  is  taken  to  lay  before  the  readei 
every  foreign  picture  which  appears  to  possess  general  interest.  In 
a  word,  the  Subscriber  to  Harper's  Weekly  may  rely  upon  ob- 
taining a  Pictorial  History  of  the  times  in  which  we  live,  compiled 
and  illustrated  in  the  most  perfect  and  complete  manner  possible. 
It  is  believed  that  the  Illustrated  Biographies  alone — of  which  about 
one  hundred  and  fifty  have  already  been  published — are  worth  far 
more  to  the  reader  than  the  whole  cost  ot  his  subscription. 

The  literary  matter  of  Harper's  Weekly  is  supplied  by  some 
of  the  ablest  writers  in  the  English  language.  Every  Number  con- 
tains an  installment  of  a  serial  story  by  a  first-class  author — Bul- 
wer's  "  What  will  he  do  mthlt?"  has  appeared  entire  in  its  columns; 
one  or  more  short  Stories,  the  best  that  can  be  purchased  at  home 
or  abroad ;  the  best  Poetry  of  the  day  ;  instructive  Essays  on  topics 
of  general  interest ;  Comments  on  the  Events  of  the  time,  in  the 
shape  of  Editorials  and  the  Lounger's  philosophic  and  amusing 
Gossip ;  searching  but  generous  Literary  Criticisms ;  a  Chess  Chron- 
icle ;  and  full  and  careful  reports  of  the  Money,  Merchandise,  and 
Produce  Markets. 

In  fixing  at  so  low  a  price  as  Five  Cents  the  price  of  their  paper, 
the  Publishers  were  aware  that  nothing  but  an  enormous  sale  could 
remunerate  them.  They  are  happy  to  say  that  the  receipts  have 
already  realized  their  anticipations,  and  justify  still  further  efforts 
to  make  Harper's  Weekly  an  indispensable  guest  in  every  home 
throughout  the  country. 

TERMS.— One  Cop-  for  Tvrenty  Weeks,  $1  00 ;  One  Copy  for  One  Year,  $2  50 ; 
One  Copy  for  Two  Years,  $4  00  ;  Five  Copies  for  One  Year,  $0  00;  Twelve  Cop- 
ies for  One  Year,  $20  00;  Twenty-five  Copies  for  One  Year,  $40  00.  An  Extra 
Copy  will  be  allowed  for  every  Club  of  Twelve  or  Twenty-five  Subscribers. 


ty  Every  Number  of  Harper's  Magazine  contains  from  20  to  50  pages — and 
from  one  third  to  one  half  more  reading — than  any  other  in  the  country. 


HARPER'S  MAGAZINE. 

The  Publishers  believe  that  the  Ninenteen  Volumes  of  Harper's 
Magazine  now  issued  contain  a  larger  amount  of  valuable  and  at- 
tractive reading  than  will  be  found  in  any  other  periodical  of  the 
day.  The  best  Serial  Tales  of  the  foremost  Novelists  of  the  time: 
Levers'  "Maurice  Tiernay,"  Bulwer  Lytton's  "My  Novel," 
Dickens's  "Bleak  House"  and  "Little  Dorrit,"  Thackeray's 
"Newcomes"  aud  "Virginians,"  have  successively  appeared  in  the 
Magazine  simultaneously  with  their  publication  in  England.  The 
best  Tales  and  Sketches  from  the  Foreign  Magazines  have  been 
carefully  selected,  and  original  contributions  have  been  furnished 
by  Charles  Reade,  Wilkie  Collins,  Mrs.  Gaskell,  Miss  Mu- 
loch,  and  other  prominent  English  writers. 

The  larger  portion  of  the  Magazine  has,  however,  been  devoted 
to  articles  upon  American  topics,  furnished  by  American  writers. 
Contributions  have  been  welcomed  from  every  section  of  the  coun- 
try ;  and  in  deciding  upon  their  acceptance  the  Editors  have  aimed 
to  be  governed  solely  by  the  intrinsic  merits  of  the  articles,  irrespect- 
ive of  their  authorship.  Care  has  been  taken  that  the  Magazine 
should  never  become  the  organ  of  any  local  clique  in  literature,  or 
of  any  sectional  party  in  politics. 

At  no  period  since  the  commencement  of  the  Magazine  have  its 
literary  and  artistic  resources  been  more  ample  and  varied ;  and  the 
Publishers  refer  to  the  contents  of  the  Periodical  for  the  past  as  the 
best  guarantee  for  its  future  claims  upon  the  patronage  of  the  Amer- 
ican public. 


TERMS.— One  Copy  for  One  Year,  $3  00 ;  Two  Copies  for  One  Year,  $5  00; 
Three  or  more  Copies  for  One  Year  (each),  $2  00;  "Harper's  Magazine"  and 
"Harper's  Weekly,"  One  Year,  $4  00.  And  an  Extra  Copy,  gratis,  for  every 
Chib  o/Ten  Subscribers. 

Clergymen  and  Teachers  supplied  at  Two  Dollars  a  year.  The  Semi-Au- 
nual  Volumes  hound  in  Cloth,  $2  50  each.  Muslin  Covers,  25  cents  each.  The 
Postage  upon  Harper's  Magazine  must  be  paid  at  the  Office  where  it  is  received. 
The  Postage  is  Thirty-hit  Cents  a  year. 

HARPER  &  BROTHERS,  Publishers,  Franklin  Square,  New  York. 


Miss  Muloch's  Novels 


The  Novels,  of  which  a  reprint  is  now  presented  to  the  public, 
form  one  of  the  most  admirable  series  of  popular  fiction  that  has 
recently  been  issued  from  the  London  press.  They  are  marked  by 
their  faithful  delineation  of  character,  their  naturalness  and  purity 
of  sentiment,  the  dramatic  interest  of  their  plots,  their  beauty  and 
force  of  expression,  and  their  elevated  moral  tone.  No  current 
Novels  can  be  more  highly  recommended  for  the  family  library, 
while  their  brilliancy  and  vivacity  will  make  them  welcome  to  every 
reader  of  cultivated  taste. 


A     LIFE  FOR  A  LIFE.      8vo,  Paper,  50  cents;    i2mo, 
-  Muslin,  $1  00. 


JOHN    HALIFAX,  Gentleman.      8vo,  Paper,  50  cents; 
Library  Edition.      i2mo,  Muslin,  $1  00. 


/^LIVE.     8vo,  Paper,  25  cents. 


'"pHE  OGILVIES.     8vo,  Paper,  25 


cents. 


'-pHE    HEAD    OF    THE    FAMILY.     8vo,  Paper,  37 J 

cents. 


A 


GATHA'S  HUSBAND.     8vo,  Paper,  37^  cents. 


A 


HERO,  BREAD  UPON  THE  WATERS,  AND 
ALICE  LEARMONT.  i2mo,  Muslin,  50  cents; 
Paper,  38  cents. 


N 


Miss   IIULOCH'B    No  V  i:  LB. 
OTHING   NEW.     Tales.     8vo,  Paper,  50  cents. 


A 


VILLION,  and  other  Tales.      8vo,  Paper,  50  cents. 


[From  the  North  British  Review.~\ 

MISS    MULOCH'S    NOVELS. 

She  attempts  to  show  how  the  trials,  perplexities,  joys,  sorrows, 
labors,  and  successes  of  life,  deepen  or  wither  the  character,  accord- 
ing to  its  inward  bent. 

She  cares  to  teach,  not  how  dishonesty  is  always  plunging  men 
into  infinitely  more  complicated  external  difficulties  than  it  would 
in  real  life,  but  how  any  continued  insincerity  gradually  darkens 
and  corrupts  the  very  life  springs  of  the  mind ;  not  how  all  events 
conspire  to  crush  an  unreal  being  who  is  to  be  the  "example"  of 
the  story,  but  how  every  event,  adverse  or  fortunate,  tends  to 
strengthen  and  expand  a  high  mind,  and  to  break  the  springs  of  a 
selfish  or  even  merely  weak  and  self-indulgent  nature. 

She  does  not  limit  herself  to  domestic  conversations,  and  the 
mere  shock  of  character  on  character  ;  she  includes  a  large  range 
of  events — the  influence  of  wordly  successes  and  failures — the  risks 
of  commercial  enterprise — the  power  of  social  position — in  short, 
the  various  elements  of  a  wider  economy  than  that  generally  ad- 
mitted into  a  tale. 

She  has  a  true  respect  for  her  work,  and  never  permits  herself  to 
"make  books,"  and  yet  she  has  evidently  very  great  facility  in 
making  them. 

There  are  few  writers  who  have  exhibited  a  more  marked  prog- 
ress, whether  in  freedom  of  touch  or  in  depth  of  purpose,  than  the 
authoress  of  "The  Ogilvies"  and  "John  Halifax." 

Published  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS, 

Franklin  Square,  New  York. 


Habpf.r  &  Bbotitehb  will  sci>-\  the  above  "Works  by  Mail,  postage  paid  (for  any 
distance  in  the  United  States  under  3000  miles),  on  receipt  of  the  Money. 


Haepee  &  Beothees  will  send  the  following  Works  by  Mail,  postage  paid  (for  any 
distance  in  the  United  States  under  3000  miles),  on  receipt  of  the  Money. 


THE  BRONTE  NOVELS. 


THE  PROFESSOR.  By  Currer  Bell  (Charlotte  Bronte).  12mo, 
Paper,  60  cents;  Muslin,  75  cents. 

JANE  EYRE.  An  Autobiography.  Edited  by  Currer  Bell 
(Charlotte  Bronte).  Library  Edition.  12rno,  Muslin,  75  cents. — Cheap 
Edition.     Svo,  Paper  37£  cents. 

SHIRLEY.  A  Tale.  By  the  Author  of  "Jane  Eyre."  Library 
Edition.  12mo,  Muslin.  75  cents. — Cheap  Edition.  8vo,  Paper,  37i 
cents. 

YILLETTE.  By  the  Author  of  "  Jane  Eyre,"  and  "  Shirley."  Li~ 
brary  Edition.  12mo,  Muslin,  75  cents. — Cheap  Edition.  Svo,  Paper. 
50  cents 

WUTHERING  HEIGHTS.  By  Ellis  Bell  (Emily  Bronte). 
l2mo,  Muslin,  75  cents. 

THE  TENANT  OF  WILDFELL  HALL.  By  Acton  Bell 
(Anna  Bronte.)     12mo,  Muslin,  75  cents 

The  wondrous  power  of  Currer  Bell's  stories  consists  in  their  fiery  insight  into  the 
human  heart,  their  merciless  dissection  of  passion,  and  their  stern  analysis  of  char- 
acter and  motive.  The  style  of  these  productions  possesses  incredible  force — some- 
times almost  grim  in  its  bare  severity— then  relapsing  into  passages  of  melting  pa- 
thos— always  direct,  natural,  and  effective  in  its  unpretending  strength.  They  ex- 
hibit the  identity  which  always  belongs  to  works  of  genius  by  the  same  author, 
though  without  the  slightest  approach  to  monotony.  The  characters  portrayed  by 
Currer  Bell  all  have  a  strongly-marked  individuality.  Once  brought  before  the  im- 
agination, they  haunt  the  memory  like  a  strange  dream.  The  sinewy,  muscular 
strength  of  her  w-ritings  guarantees  their  permanent  duration,  and  thus  far  they  have 
lost  nothing  of  their  intensity  of  interest  since  the  period  of  their  composition. 

Published  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS,  Franklin  Square,  ff,  T, 


Habpkb  A  Bkothkks  will  send  either  of  the  following  Works  by  Mail,  poBt- 
1  (for  any  distance  In  the  United  States  under  3000  miles),  on  receipt  of 
the  Mo 


MRS.  MARSH'S  NOVELS. 


Beyond  most  modern  writers,  the  author  seems  to  have  an  in- 
stinctive perception  of  human  impulses,  and  an  unsurpassed  power 
of  drawing  delicate  shades  of  character.  Her  works  may  worthily 
take  place  among  the  best  modern  fictions. — London  Critic. 


The  Rose  of  Ashurst.    8vo, 
Paper,  50  cents. 

Evelyn  Marston.     8vo,  Pa- 
per, 50  cents. 

Angela.       12mo,   Paper,    75 
cents ;  Muslin,  90  cents. 

Tales  of  the  "Woods  and 
Fields.    12mo,  Muslin,  75  cents. 

Time    the   Avenger.     8vo, 
Paper,  25  cents. 

Adelaide    Lindsay.      8vo, 
Paper,     25  cents. 

The    Wilmingtons.      8vo, 
Paper,  25  cents. 

Lettice   Arnold.     8vo,  Pa- 
per, 10  cents. 

Mordaunt   Hall.     8vo,  Pa- 
per, 25  cents. 


Norman's  Bridge.    8vo,  Pa- 
per, 25  cents. 

Father  Darcy.     8vo,  Paper, 
25  cents. 

.    Emilia     Wyndham.      8vo, 
Paper,  25  cents. 

The    Triumphs    of   Time. 

8vo,  Paper,  25  cents. 

Mount    Sorel.     8vo,  Paper, 
12$  cents. 

Ravenscliffe.       8vo,    Paper, 
37£  cents. 

Castle    Avon.     8vo,  Paper, 
37£  cents. 

Aubrey.       Svo,    Paper,    37$- 
cents. 

The    Heiress    of    Haugh- 
ton.     8vo,  Paper,  37^  cents. 


Published  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS, 

Wariklin  Square,  New  York. 


m.  LIVINGSTONE'S  TRAVELS. 

Missionary  Travels  and  Researches  in  South  Africa;  including  a 
Sketch  of  Sixteen  Years'  Residence  in  the  Interior  of  Africa,  and 
a  Journey  from  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  to  Loan  do  on  the  West 
Coast ;  thence  across  the  Continent,  down  the  River  Zambesi,  to 
the  Eastern  Ocean.  By  David  Livingstone,  LL.D.,  D.C.L. 
Two  Maps  by  Arrowsmith,  a  Portrait  on  Steel,  and  numerous 
Illustrations.  New  Edition,  with  Copious  Index.  One  Volume, 
8vo,  Price  $3  00. 


NOTICE. 

Messrs.  Harper  &  Brothers  take  this  opportunity  of  cautioning  the  public 
against  several  spurious  publications,  which,  by  artful  advertisements,  are  made 
to  appear  as  though  emanating  from  Dr.  Livingstone.  They  are  authorised  to 
say  that  Dr.  Livingstone  repudiates  them  entirely,  and  wishes  it  to  be  generally 
known  that  the  present  work  is  the  only  authentic  narrative  of  his  Adventures 
and  Travels  in  Africa. 

A  book  which,  before  it  has  been  ten  days  in  the  hands  of  the  public,  will 
have  been  perused  by  perhaps  30,000  readers — a  book  second  only  to  Lord  Mac- 
aulay's  History  of  England  in  the  inordinate  extent  of  its  circulation.  Xo  won- 
der— it  addresses  itself  to  large  and  numerous  classes — the  great  religious  world, 
the  commercial  world,  the  scientific. — Literary  Gazette. 

The  book  is  one  of  the  most  captivating  description  ;  in  style  simple,  clear,  and 
graphic,  and  in  matter  such  as  no  other  living  traveler's  experience  could  afford. 
From  the  beginning  to  the  end  of  the  volume  there  is  not  a  page  that  does  not 
compel  the  attention,  not  a  page  that  does  not  offer  something  novel.  It  is  a 
wonder-book  all  through. — X.  Y.  Coxirier  and  Enquirer. 

This  remarkable  narrative,  distinguished  throughout  by  the  modesty  charac- 
teristic of  true  merit.  Clear,  concise,  unaffected,  and  fluent,  it  charms  the  read- 
er, and  bears  him  along  irresistibly,  securing  his  attention  from  first  to  last.— • 
X.  Y.  Commercial  Advertiser. 

At  once  scientific,  literary,  and  religious,  it  deserves  to  be  read  and  studied  by 
all  classes. — Boston  Post. 

A  new  chapter  in  the  history  of  the  world. — Boston  Leader. 

Since  the  days  of  Mandevilie,  Marco  Polo,  and  Captain  Cooke,  no  one  person 
has  traversed  a  more  extended  theatre  of  travel,  or  added  more  to  the  great  dis- 
coveries of  the  world  than  Dr.  Livingstone.  The  work  combines  the  dignity  of 
scientific  research  with  thrilling  narratives  of  personal  adventure. — Richmond 
Enquirer. 

The  African  Columbus  has  broken  the  egg,  and  let  the  world  into  his  secret. 
What  he  has  achieved,  and  endured,  and  conquered ;  the  witchcraft  which,  for 
sixteen  years,  he  has  used  against  a  vertical  sun  and  a  malign  climate — how  he 
has  run  the  gauntlet  of  carnivores  and  pachyderms,  and  ophidia — how  he  has 
lived  on  roots,  and  locusts,  and  frogs,  and  moistened  his  mouth  only  with  rain 
or  river  water — how  he  has  striven  with  thirst  and  fever,  with  the  loss  of  letters 
and  the  absence  of  intelligent  companionship — how  he  has  sounded  unknown 
lakes,  broken  through  thorny  jungles,  navigated  unknown  rivers,  opened  to  light 
a  world  teeming  with  floral,  animal,  and  mineral  wonders— obtaining  ingress  for 
science,  for  commerce,  for  religion — and  leading  after  him,  as  the  special  spoils 
of  his  expedition,  a  throng  of  colored  indigeni,  drawn  along  by  no  other  fetters 
save  of  love  and  admiration.  So  runs  the  story  of  his  book — a  book  not  so  much 
of  travel  and  adventure  as,  in  its  purport  and  spacious  relation,  a  veritable  poem. 
— A  thenceum. 

The  book  will  be  sought  For  and  read  with  more  eagerness  than  a  romance. — 
X.  Y.  Obsei-ver. 

Published  by  HARPER   &   BROTHERS, 

Franklin  Square,  New  York. 


V  Harper  &  Brothers  will  send  the  above  Work  by  Mail,  postage  paid  (for  any 
distance  in  the  United  States  under  3000  miles),  on  receipt  of  Three  Dollars. 


"  The  most  magnificent  contribution  of  die  present  cen- 
tury to  the  cause  of  geographical  knowledge." 

DR.  BARTH'S 
NORTH  AND  CENTRAL  AFRICA. 


Travels  and  Discoveries  in  North  and  Central  Africa.      Being  a 

Journal  of  an   Expedition  undertaken  under  the  Auspices  of 

H.B.M's   Government   in    the   Years    1849-1855.      By   Henry 

Barth,  Ph.D.,  D.C.L.,  Fellow  of  the  Royal  Geographical  and 

Asiatic  Societies,  &c,  &c.     Profusely  and  elegantly  illustrated. 

Complete  in  3  vols.  8vo,  Muslin,  $2  50  a  Volume ;  Half  Calf, 

$10  50  a  set. 

Dr.  Barth' s  wonderful  travels  approach  the  Equator  from  the  North  as  nearly 
as  Dr.  Livingstone's  from  the  South,  and  thus  show  to  future  travelers  the  field 
which  still  remains  open  for  exploration  and  research. — Vol.  III.,  completing 
the  work,  is  in  the  press,  and  will  be  published  shortly. 

The  researches  of  Dr.  Barth  are  of  the  highest  interest.  Few  men  have  ex- 
isted so  qualified,  both  by  intellectual  ability  and  a  vigorous  bodily  constitution, 
for  the  perilous  part  of  an  African  discoverer  as  Dr.  Barth. — London  Times, 
Sept.  8,  1857. 

It  richly  merits  all  the  commendation  bestowed  upon  it  by  "the  leading  jour- 
nal of  Europe." — Corr.  National  Intelligencer. 

Every  chapter  presents  matter  of  more  original  interest  than  an  ordinary  vol. 
ume  of  travels. — London  Leader. 

For  extent  and  variety  of  subjects,  the  volumes  before  us  greatly  surpass  every 
other  work  on  African  travel  with  which  it  has  been  our  fortune  to  meet. — Lon. 
don  Athenceum. 

Dr.  Barth  is  the  model  of  an  explorer — patient,  persevering,  and  resolute. — 
London  Spectator. 

No  one  who  wishes  to  know  Africa  can  afford  to  dispense  with  this  work. — Bos- 
ton Traveler. 

A  most  wonderful  ro.covA.—Poughkee]ysie  Democrat. 

It  is  the  most  magnificent  contribution  of  the  present  century  to  the  cause  of 
geographical  knowledge. — N.  Y.  Evangelist. 

The  most  important  contribution  to  Geographical  Science  that  has  been  made 
in  our  time.  Thousands  of  readers  in  our  country  will  be  anxious  to  get  poses- 
sion  of  this  treasure  of  knowledge. — X.  Y.  Observer. 

One  of  the  most  important  works  of  the  kind  which  has  appeared  for  an  age. — 
Lutheran  Observer. 

It  can  not  fail  to  find  its  way  into  the  libraries  of  most  scholars. — Lynchburg 
Virginian. 

The  personal  details  give  the  work  great  interest. — Philadelphia  Press. 

Dr.  Ilarth's  work  is  a  magnificent  contribution  to  geographical  and  ethno- 
graphical science. — N.  Y.  Independent. 

Your  curiosity  is  awakened,  step  by  step,  as  with  diminished  resources  he 
works  his  way  through  fanatical  and  rapacious  tribes,  ready  in  resources  and 
never  desponding,  and  buoyed  up  by  the  unconquerable  desire  to  surpass  his 
predecessors  in  the  thoroughness  and  in  the  range  of  his  discoveries. — Albion. 

Among  the  most  wonderful  achievements  of  modern  times. —  Western  Christian 
Advocate. 

A  most  valuable  contribution  to  the  standard  literature  of  the  world.— Troy 

Tllll>:<. 

Published   by   HARPER    &    BROTHERS, 

Franklin   Square,  New   York. 


•  .*  II  abpeb  &  Bbotdjebs  will  send  the  above  Work  by  Mail,  postage  paid  (for 
any  distance  in  the  I'nited  States  under  3000  miles),  on  receipt  of  the  Money. 


LA    PLATA: 

THE  AEGENTINE  CONFEDEEATION, 

ANT> 

PARAGUAY. 

Being  a  Narrative  of  the  Exploration  of  the  Tributaries  of  the  River 
La  Plata  and  Adjacent  Countries,  during  the  Years  1853,  '54,  '55, 
and  '56,  under  the  orders  of  the  United  States  Government. 

By  THOMAS  J.  PAGE,  U.S.N., 

Commander  of  the  Expedition. 

One  Volume  Large  Octavo,  with  Map  and  numerous  Illustrations. 
Muslin,  Three  Dollars. 

This  Volume  contains  the  Official  Narrative  of  one  of  the  most  important  ex- 
peditions ever  sent  out  by  our  Government.  Early  in  1S53  the  steamer  Water 
Witch  was  placed  under  the  command  of  Lieutenant  Page,  with  instructions  to 
explore  the  Rivers  of  La  Plata,  and  report  upon  their  navigability  and  adapta- 
tion to  commerce.  Lieutenant  Page  executed  his  commission  with  rare  fidelity 
and  intelligence,  and  has  embodied  the  results  in  this  volume.  The  explora- 
tions described  in  the  Narrative  embrace  an  extent  of  3600  miles  of  river  naviga- 
tion, and  4400  miles  of  journey  by  land  in  Paraguay  and  the  Argentine  Confed- 
eration. Th3  River  Paraguay  alone  was  found  to  be  navigable,  at  low  water,  by 
a  steamer  drawing  nine  feet,  for  more  than  two  thousand  miles  from  the  ocean. 
The  basin  of  La  Plata  is  almost  equal  in  extent  to  that  of  the  Mississippi,  and 
not  inferior  in  salubrity  of  climate  and  fertility  of  soil,  while  the  head  waters  of 
its  rivers  penetrate  the  richest  mineral  provinces  of  Brazil  and  Bolivia.  The 
products  of  this  region  must  find  their  outlet  through  the  River  La  Plata.  The 
population  numbers  scarcely  one  person  to  a  square  mile,  but  great  inducements 
to  emigi-ation  are  now  offered  by  the  Argentine  Confederation.  The  commerce 
of  the  country,  already  considerable,  is  capable  of  immediate  and  almost  indef- 
inite increase. 

Lieutenant  Page's  Narrative  contains  ample  information  respecting  the  soil, 
climate,  and  productions  of  the  country,  and  the  manners,  habits,  and  customs  of 
the  people.  A  full  account  is  given  of  the  unfortunate  rupture  with  Paraguay, 
showing  conclusively  that  the  attack  upon  the  Water  Witch  was  altogether  un- 
warranted, and  the  allegations  by  which  President  Lopez  attempted  to  justify  it 
entirely  destitute  of  truth.  An  interesting  and  valuable  account  of  the  Jesuit 
Missions  in  La  Plata  is  appended  to  the  Narrative. 

The  Illustrations  comprise  the  accurate  Map  of  the  Country  prepared  by  the 
erders  of  our  Government,  Portraits  of  Urquiza,  Lopez,  Francia,  and  Loyola, 
tnd  numerous  Engravings  of  Scenery,  Character,  and  Incident. 

Published  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS, 

Franklin  Square,  Neiv  York, 


Harper  &  Brothers  will  send  the  above  Work  by  Mail,  postage  paid,  to  any 
part  of  the  United  States,  on  receiDt  of  $3  00. 


harper's  Catalogue, 


A  New  Descriptive  Catalogue  of  Harper  &  Brothers' 
Publications,  with  an  Index  and  Classified  Table  of  Contents,  is 
now  ready  for  Distribution,  and  may  be  obtained  gratuitously  on 
application  to  the  Publishers  personally,  or  by  letter  inclosing  Six 
Cents  in  Postage  Stamps. 

The  attention  of  gentlemen,  in  town  or  country,  designing  to  form 
Libraries  or  enrich  their  Literary  Collections,  is  respectfully  invited 
to  this  Catalogue,  which  will  be  found  to  comprise  a  large  propor- 
tion of  the  standard  and  most  esteemed  woi'ks  in  English  Literature 
— comprehending  more  than  two  thousand  volumes  —  which 
are  offered,  in  most  instances,  at  less  than  one  half  the  cost  of  sim- 
ilar productions  in  England. 

To  Librarians  and  others  connected  with  Colleges.  Schools,  <fec, 
who  may  not  have  access  to  a  reliable  guide  in  forming  the  true 
estimate  of  literary  productions,  it  is  believed  this  Catalogue  will 
prove  especially  valuable  as  a  manual  of  reference. 

To  prevent  disappointment,  it  is  suggested  that,  whenever  books 
can  not  be  obtained  through  any  bookseller  or  local  agent,  applica- 
tions with  remittance  should  be  addressed  direct  to  the  Publishers, 
which  will  be  promptly  attended  to. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 
BERKELEY 

Return  to  desk  from  which  borrowed. 

This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 

s 

IN  STACKS 

MAR  2  0 1956 

■     • 

&** 

,  ••:  =>     "  ''"- 

H0V 141963 

RECD  LD 

N0\I2  5'63^PM 

LD  21-100m-9,'47(A57028l6)476 


r 


m 


